


In The Forest, Dark And Deep

by Welsh_Woman



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, M/M, Magical Claudia Stilinski, Spark!Stiles
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-20
Updated: 2018-07-20
Packaged: 2019-06-13 08:37:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 24,537
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15360513
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Welsh_Woman/pseuds/Welsh_Woman
Summary: The woods have been Stiles' home for all his life, so when something Dark starts to creep in, it's obvious that his world is going to change...In more ways than one.





	1. A New Beginning

**Author's Note:**

  * For [the_problem_with_stardust](https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_problem_with_stardust/gifts).



> This was inspired by the wonderful art of the_problem_with_stardust and I highly recommend you click that link and check it out!

Mieczyslaw ‘Stiles’ Stilinski has lived in the forest all his life.

His father had been (and still is) a hunter and had managed to get himself tangled up in the wrong end of a bear, which had led to him meeting Stiles’ mother, the local hedge witch. She patched him up with a stern warning about going after such large game by himself and stole his heart in the same evening.

Despite the rest of the village warning him away from the strange woman in the woods, or perhaps in _spite_ of those warnings, Johnathan Stilinski packed his belongings and moved into the woods as soon as Claudia Wiśniewski allowed him to propose to her.

(“I _did_ love him, very much,” Claudia was always quick to reassure a young Stiles when he asked at this part of the story, “but just because I loved him didn’t mean that I was sure he wasn’t someone that would do me harm. I had to be _very_ sure before I allowed him in my house.”

“I could tell that she was worried, so I did my very best to make sure that she never had anything to fear from me.” Johnathan always says, giving his wife a loving look that never failed to make a young Stiles stick his tongue out. “Thankfully, I didn’t have to wait very long!”

“More like I couldn’t stand your puppy eyes for so long!”

“Whatever you say, dear.”)

It had only been a few months of marriage before Claudia had announced that she was pregnant, something that had apparently caused John to celebrate for two nights straight and need Claudia’s hangover cure for the next three…

Stiles had asked, once, why he didn’t have any brothers or sisters if his Daddy was that happy about finding out about Stiles. His mother and father had looked at each other in a sad sort of way that had Stiles feeling bad for asking in the first place, before settling in together to tell Stiles why:

It had been a few days before Stiles was supposed to be born when Claudia had a dream that said she would need a certain animal bone to grind and drink while she gave birth. Unfortunately, she didn’t have any at the time and asked Stiles’ Daddy to get her some.

John had been uneasy going out to hunt with Stiles so close to being born, but Claudia had insisted that Stiles still had a bit before he was due and that there was plenty of time for John to go out and come back, especially since Claudia had seen the exact location that he needed to go to.

After a bit of arguing-which Claudia had won because Stiles’ Mommy _always_ won-John had packed up his gear, kissed his wife goodbye, and set out for the clearing that his wife directed him towards.

He hadn’t been gone for more than a day before the labor pains began to hit Claudia, harder and faster than she had thought possible.

(Stiles had needed a hug at this part of the story, upset that his Mommy had been hurt while bringing him into the world. Claudia was quick to let him know that she would suffer a thousand pains if it meant that she got to hold her special boy…)

The next few hours were exceptionally painful for Claudia and she knew she had to make a choice; drink a concoction that would ease her pain long enough for John to return with the bone she needed or suffer through the pain and risk losing Stiles before John ever arrived.

For Claudia, at that moment, there was no choice to make.

Unfortunately, due to the mixture of that poultice and the one she drank from John when he returned (apologetic and apoplectic in turns), Claudia had been unable to have any other children.

Stiles had been nearly inconsolable when he had heard that, fearing that he had somehow hurt his mother in some way, but Claudia had also been insistent that she was more than happy with her little miracle and that he was more than enough for her.

(Depending on whether or not Stiles had been ‘a bit of trouble’ that day, that phrase was said with more fondness than exasperation.)

Still, Johnathan, Claudia, and Stiles nevertheless lived a very happy life in their house in the woods. John hunted the game that the family needed to eat, while Claudia gathered the herbs that healed them, teaching Stiles her ways as soon as the boy started showing signs of having his own Spark.

It would be a perfect life… if not for the village that lay on the borders of the forest.

The village of Beacon has been standing on the edge of Stiles’ forest for all of his life, and his Papa says that it’s been there all _his_ life, as well. Stiles isn’t sure, exactly, when Beacon was built, but there’s not a day that goes by when he doesn’t wish that it would burn to the ground.

The reason for this is very simple; despite the fact that Claudia Stilinski has never done any harm to the village, that she has given them herbs and remedies from everything from a fussy baby to a fever that threatened a young boy’s life, nearly everyone in the village has treated her with disgust, disdain, and some with downright _loathing_.

Stiles **_hates_** it.

He _hates_ how they come simpering for their cures one moment, then they are spitting on the street as they walk by the next. _Hates_ how they sing her praises when the latest fever has been quelled, then denounce her as a demon the next time they see her, even if it’s _the same day_!

“I can do something that they cannot, my little spark,” is always the answer he is given when he asks his mother **_why_** ; why she puts up with it, why she lets them speak so lowly of her, why she doesn’t just refuse to help them when they come calling. “That frightens them, and sometimes, when people are frightened, they tend to lash out at what frightens them instead of trying to understand it.”

Stiles can’t understand that; _he’s_ frightened of how the village can look at his mother and see a devil, more for her sake than for theirs, and _he_ never raised a hand against any of them!

(Although, he _has_ thought about it. Many, many times…)

Claudia always brushes a hand through his hair when he mentions this, a sad smile gracing her face as she says, “Keep ahold of that strength, my darling, it will prove to them that there is nothing to fear.”

So, even though he hates the village and everything it stands for, Stiles holds his tongue (and his hand, when his Spark becomes more than just a light for him to play with and something that his mother instructs him on every day), keeping mostly to the woods that surround their cottage and dreaming of a place that he and his mother can be who they are without being judged for it.

Stiles knows that a place like that might never exist, but he dreams of it all the same…

 

* * *

 

Derek Sebastian Hale has lived in the village of Beacon all his life.

The second child of Talia and Bruce Hale, their first son (and only child that is not responsible for any of the gray hairs that curl over his mother’s ears, if you asked her), he has sat on the village council ever since he was old enough to understand what politics were.

Bruce Hale (nee Bliadd) has always been proud of the fact that one of his children wanted to take over his seat when he retired; he would always tell them, even when there had been times they didn’t want to listen, that he had met their mother sitting in that chair.

Talia Hale had been arguing against Bruce that day, not really a member of the council, but chosen to represent part of the village, and she had captivated him with her passionate desire to work for the good of the entire town. He had been swayed and smitten all in the same moment, agreeing to her terms and asking for permission to court her all in the same breath.

A little flabbergasted by the change, Talia had agreed, despite being a little wary that the whole thing was some sort of setup to get her to change her views. The entire evening _had_ been them debating various different points, both political and personal, but the night ended on a more pleasant note than it began.

(Despite never quite telling them what that pleasant note might be, the fact that they were married and had six children - as well as the look they always gave each other at that point - told Derek he didn’t really want to know.)

Hearing of all the good that his father had done on the council-and perhaps, a little hopeful that he may meet someone special the way his parents had-Derek had immediately volunteered when Bruce had said he was stepping down.

Laura had immediately called him an old bore trapped in a young man’s body, earning her a flick to the ear from her mother that made her yelp.

Derek wasn’t all that bothered by it; being born only minutes before him and never wasting an opportunity to tease him for it, Laura had been a constant thorn in his side that Derek had learned to live with.

Aside from annoying siblings that tried to get on his nerves, or just ignored him altogether(Cora), life in the village was relatively quiet and calm; the people are welcoming and respectful to his mother and family, there’s a hunter that lives on the outskirts of town that keeps them well fed with venison and other game, and the peace is kept with the Counsel weighing in on the village’s wants and needs.

All in all, it’s a bit _dull_.

So, Derek is understandably excited when there is a chance to do something a little different one warm, summer evening.

“There have been reports of animals being slaughtered in the forest,” Alan Deaton, council head and never one for giving all the facts, says that night. His voice is mild and barely louder than the way he usually talks, but it nevertheless grabs everyone’s attention. “Not for any need for food but slaughtered and their remains spread about the woods in a rather… worrying pattern.”

A rumble of dissent immediately follows these words and it isn’t long before a voice calls out, “What do John’s demon and her spawn have to say about this?”

Derek matches Deaton’s frown as he tries to see who said that. Yes, he has heard the rumors of a witch on the edge of the forest, preying on the village’s bad luck, but he also has seen John’s wife help his mother through Matthew’s birth, not two months hence-her son flitting around the outside of the house like a shadow-so he doesn’t really see how the woman could be a _demon_ …

“Claudia and Stiles both say that they had nothing to do with these maulings, and John has volunteered to search the Deep Forest to make sure that nothing has crossed from their boundary into ours, so I have little belief that whatever this thing is has come from their quarter.”

The mutters do not die off at that, but they do get quieter, and Derek frowns down at his hands at the comments buzzing around like angry bees whose nest has just been upturned:

_“I don’t understand why he just lets them get away with things like this…!”_

_“ **Of course** , they’re going to admit to nefarious deeds! What, do they think we’re **simpletons**?”_

_“I wish Harris was still alive. He was the only one brave enough to try to reason with those two…”_

Derek’s curiosity is peaked with that last grumble; Harris, stern and unfriendly man that he was, had been a sort of representative of the village and had gone out to speak to more than one traveler on the village’s behalf. Derek hadn’t known he had gone to see Claudia and Stiles – from the sound of it, more than once, even – as well.

“Giving into our fear isn’t going to solve anything,” Deaton is saying, looking as annoyed as Derek has ever seen him, “We need to come up with a plan on how we are going to approach whoever is doing these killings and figure out why they are doing so as well.”

With the unrest from the crowd growing the more Derek sits there, he decides that there is something that he can do and gets up from his seat, a move that immediately silences the entire hall.

(This may be because, despite Derek wanting to help the village, his own words on the matter have been few and far between. He has more lent his voice to other’s debates and rarely made a declaration of his own. His actions now must be a bit of a shock…)

Fighting off the blush he can feel at nearly all the village looking at him in earnest, Derek clears his throat and states, “Since there is still unease regarding Claudia and her son, I volunteer to take Harris’ place as a representative of the village and talk with them directly. I will observe and note their movements to make sure that they are not the ones responsible for the attacks and report back to the village what I find. We can make a more thorough plan afterward. Are there any objections?”

Silence is his answer.

Derek nods once to the village, once to Deaton, and then makes his way out of the hall and away from all the eyes that feel like they’re boring holes into his back.

Nevertheless, he feels a little excited by the prospect of finally meeting ‘the dreaded witch’ and her son. Granted, it’s probably just the village being fearful again, but who knows?

Maybe Derek will finally see something different for once!


	2. Changing The Habit

“Do you have to leave?”

John sighs and pulls Stiles into a hug, taking a moment to rub his hand through the steadily growing tuffs on top of his kid’s head. He’s going to need a haircut soon… “You know I have to. Whatever this thing is, we need to know what we’re dealing with as soon as possible so that no one ends up being hurt if we could avoid it.”

“I know that.” Stiles does, he just hates the thought of his father going out while there is something in their woods that even his mother can’t See. “I just don’t understand why it has to be you thumping through the woods right now!”

“Because I’m the best hunter in the woods, that’s why.” John can’t resist running a hand through his son’s hair again, even as Stiles huffs at him. “Besides, even if your mother can’t See it, she can still See me, so I’ll be perfectly fine.”

“That’s the only reason that I’m even allowing this in the first place!”

“Glad to know that I’ve gathered your approval, son. Despite being a grown man that can take care of himself!”

“You’ve never had to ‘take care of yourself’ against something that is unquestionably magic before! The most that you’ve ever gone against is a grumpy bear!”

“And those things can be just as, if not more so, dangerous! I know what I’m doing, Stiles, it’s not like I’m going into this blindly!”

“I know that,” Stiles raises his hands, trying to bring everything down from the shouting it inevitably turned into. “I know that you can take care of yourself, Dad, it’s just that this whole thing… something about it doesn’t feel right…”

“I understand your worry, son, this is making all of us be a little on edge,” John claps a hand on Stiles’ shoulder and gives it a squeeze before leaning down so that Stiles has to meet his eyes. “You just need to trust that your mother and I know what we are doing… and don’t think I missed all of those protective charms you’ve snuck into my pack, either!”

“You should be glad that he loves you enough to badger you, instead of just waving you off without a care in the world,” Claudia interjects, moving between father and son to wrap John up in a kiss.

Rolling his eyes behind them, Stiles makes his way out of the house so that his parents could have their own goodbye in private. He knows his mother is just as worried as he is and wants to make sure that his dad has everything he needs (plus a few charms she can hide on him, as well), so Stiles lets them have a few moments to themselves.

It’s not like this is the first time that his father has ever gone hunting in the Deep Forest, nor is it the first time that Stiles has seen him off on these trips, but the fact that his mother can’t See where John is heading has Stiles more than a little on edge and, going by the mutters Stiles can hear before he moves away from the cottage, his mother isn’t that far behind him…

Nonetheless, Stiles knows that there is no talking his father out of this; much like his mother, John has made his life’s work protecting and caring for Beacon – his wife and son only just above the village itself – and he’s not going to sit idly by while there is something out there that may end up hurting them.

Still, Stiles can’t help but pull at his Spark as his father leaves the cottage, whispering a prayer to the Goddess that his father’s travels are safe and without danger, brushing an anxious hand down John’s shoulder as he passes him.

His father catches the movement and gives Stiles’ hand a squeeze before it drops from his arm. “I’ll be _fine_ , you pair of worrywarts!”

Stiles hears his mother echo his thoughts of that behind him, but he nevertheless steps back from his father and lets him leave the clearing their cottage is, John sending one last wave behind him before he’s swallowed up by the trees.

“He will be fine,” Claudia insists as she grips Stiles’ shoulder much the way his father had only a few moments before, her tone making it hard for Stiles to tell if she’s trying to reassure him or herself. “After all, with all the protections we’ve given him, how could he not be?”

A laugh slips past Stiles' lips at that, before it’s followed by a heavy sigh. “How long do you think we have before Harris is huffing and puffing his way up here to remind us that the villagers think we’re vicious demons just waiting for the right moment to strike?”

Claudia’s sigh makes Stiles feel a little guilty for his words, even as her hand drops from his shoulder, but Harris has never been as vicious as he could be within her earshot as he is with Stiles. It makes Stiles push the feeling down and try not to shrink under the disappointment he can feel aimed at his back, even as another sigh leaves his mother’s lips.

“It shouldn’t be more than a day or so after news of your father leaving reaches the village.” Claudia finally concedes, a shifting sound telling Stiles that she is heading back inside. “You have plenty of time to help me make the place look decent enough that Mr. Harris doesn’t think I’m raising you in a pigsty…”

“Not that it would make any difference, given that they think we bathe in the blood of our victims every night anyway,” Stiles mutters under his breath, giving one last look toward were his father disappeared to, wondering if he should’ve made one last argument on going with him.

“What was that?!?”

“Nothing, Mom!”

Finally pulling his eyes away from the trees surrounding them, Stiles follows his mother back inside, missing the glowing eyes that watch him go by mere minutes.

 

* * *

 

Derek is nearly bowled over as he packs for a day of traveling, dodging around curious nieces and nephews, questions following each other almost before the first person is even finished speaking:

“Are you going to see the witches today?”

“Is it true that they eat raw meat?”

“Can they turn into _animals_?”

“Are they _really_ ugly?”

“Do they eat _people_?”

“Are you gonna get _captured_ , Uncle Derek?”

“Are they going to eat **_you_**?”

“Alright, alright!” Talia Hale’s voice bounds around the room, making little one giggle as they scatter in all directions. “I think that’s enough pestering in one day, my darlings! I know more than one of you have chores they have to do!”

A chorus of groans follows that announcement, then Derek’s room is blissfully clear of children and he can actually take a moment to sit and breathe for a moment.

Talia chuckles at the look on her son’s face, before moving to sit beside him on the bed. “I adore them, but sometimes they can be a handful. It doesn’t help that Uncle Derek is going on a big adventure to see witches soon!”

“It’s not that big of a deal,” Derek groans, wiping a hand over his face as he turns toward his mother. “I doubt that the village would have allowed Claudia to set up her home so close to us if she was a Dark Witch or survived so many of Harris’ visits either.”

Talia hums in the back of her throat, rubbing a soothing hand up and down Derek’s back. “Well, Harris was more than willing to bend his rules for the right amount of gold, booze… or the warmth of a bedmate. Not that Claudia was that kind of woman, of course! She seemed more than kind when she helped me with all of you, and her son also seemed well mannered… or, at least, what little I’ve seen of him.”

Derek is once again reminded of the shadow around the house during Matthew’s birth and he has to ask his mother, “Do you think he could responsible for these killings, even if Claudia isn’t?”

Taking a moment to think about it, which actually tells Derek his answer before Talia even replies, his mother still shakes her head as she replies, “No… no, I don’t think so. Even if Stiles has some sort of vendetta against the village, he is too much like his mother and father to do something like this. If something were to happen to either of them… well, I believe that would be a different story.”

“Can we honestly say that we wouldn’t do the same?” Derek asks, leaning into the comforting warmth of his mother.

Talia hums in agreement, content to sit in silence for a few moments before she is gently pushing Derek away, so she can stand up once more.

“Well, you will be the one to see in a few hours’ time if you believe Stiles or Claudia are capable of these things, no matter what anyone else may say.” Talia pauses for a moment to place a hand on Derek’s cheek, rubbing her thumb across the crest of it as she smiles. “You will have to convince the village one way or the other, no matter what you decide, so promise me you’ll be sure in your judgment of them… no matter how long that takes.”

“Of course! I would _never_ -”

“I know, my fierce Bear,” Talia chuckled, leaning forward to place a kiss on Derek’s forehead, her smile growing at the disgruntled look her son gave her in response. “I was just reminding you not to let the village rule your decision, no matter how much you want to please them.”

Derek just makes another annoyed expression at his mother, which leads to more laughter pressed against Derek’s hair before she gives his face one last squeeze and leaves the room, herding away a few curious children who have tried to sneak back to Derek’s room.

Grinning at the way that his mother mock-growls at his kin, and the way that they screech in delight before running off again, Derek gets back to packing as he lets his mind wander to his upcoming mission:

This would be the first time that he’s ever really done something for the village – arguing about planting times and whether a crop could be saved or not notwithstanding – and there was a bit of anxiety about making sure that he did this right… There were also John, Claudia, and Stiles to consider as well; while the villager’s fears were not unfounded, he wasn’t sure that Claudia or Stiles would be so bold at to stir up trouble while sitting on Beacon’s very doorstep.

Yet, he had never really met or interacted with either of them: Claudia only stayed long enough to help with a birth, or administered a remedy, and Stiles never even set foot inside any of the cottages that made up the village, content to simply flit around like a sentry, much like he did at Derek’s house.

Even John wasn’t one to stay for long after delivering whatever it was it had hunted that day! Yes, he could be pulled into a conversation or two, and it was obvious that the village wasn’t as fearful of him as they were of the other two – although, Derek suspected that was because he was originally from the village – John never stayed longer than he could and always seemed eager to get back to his wife and son.

Then again, they _were_ his wife and son. _**Derek**_ would be eager to go home if he had that waiting for him!

Sighing again, Derek packs a few more trousers and a tunic or two, tying the sack up and heading out of his room. He places it by the doorway to the cottage where he’s lived his entire life, ready to be gathered up as soon as he leaves.

For now, though, he has a lunch to eat with his family, questions to answer from his nieces and nephews, and an older sister to ignore before he goes anywhere.

There’s plenty of time to wonder about possible Dark Witches later.


	3. Rumors/Impressions

Claudia’s prediction is proven true the very next day; the sun is barely in the middle of the sky before the windchime in the kitchen starts swaying in a nonexistent breeze, alerting them to the incoming visitor before he even makes it up the hill their cottage sits atop.

Stiles sighs and straightens his shoulders as he goes out to meet with Harris, wondering what the man is going to say today, hoping that he’s so irritated by Stiles that he leaves early, and Stiles can get back to helping his mother make what is either going to be a poultice for a fever or their lunch.

With Claudia, sometimes it was a little hard to tell…

Completely wrapped up in imagining the many ways that he can make Harris leave them alone, Stiles almost misses the man finally making it to the top of the hill.

The man who is… definitely not Harris.

Stiles blinks in surprise at the sight of ebony locks and a slightly annoyed expression instead of brown hair and a permeant scowl. As the stranger gets close enough to get a good look at his face, Stiles can see that the annoyance there is more concentration as the man makes his way up the not-entirely-clear pathway. As soon as the man makes it to where Stiles is standing and sees him, he gives Stiles a smile that reveals a pair of adorable bunny teeth.

Breathing in sharply, Stiles isn’t really sure what to do; aside from a pair of formidable eyebrows and eyes that seem to defy a single color, the man appears to be completely at ease around Stiles and even seems like he… doesn’t see him as a threat…?

“Hello,” The man’s voice was higher than what Stiles was expecting as well, given how… solid the man seems to be, and his expression dims a bit at the way that Stiles can’t seem to do anything but stare. “My name is Derek Hale. I’m the new representative from Beacon’s High Council. Are you Stiles?”

Just like that, any thoughts of whether or not this might be a lost traveler that Stiles could get to know or someone that Stiles might even want to have around disappeared and he’s left with a sinking feeling in his gut.

“Where’s Harris?” Stiles snaps, wrong-footed and feeling slightly off balanced.

“He died, a few months back,” The man, Derek, replies with a slightly furrowed brow, his expression falling more into a scowl the longer Stiles stands in his way and makes no motion of inviting Derek into the house. “I’m sorry if my being here is a shock. Where you and your mother friends with him?”

Stiles scuffs and turns on his heel, hearing Derek follow him with only a pause afterward. He’s not sure what to do with a man that isn’t spitting curses at him almost as soon as he arrives, and he thinks that perhaps his mother might be better suited for dealing with Derek then he would be right now…

It’s almost as if his thoughts had summoned her; Claudia makes it out of the cottage just as Stiles and Derek make it to the clearing, Stiles catching the same surprise on her face that no doubt covered his own upon seeing Derek for the first time.

“What happened to Harris?”

“Apparently the bastard’s dead,” Stiles snipes, ignoring the reprimanding look his mother gives him to see what Derek has to say about his outburst.

Derek merely gives him a confused look before turning his full attention to Stiles’ mother. “Adrian Harris died from an overabundance of alcohol and little care for which direction one should walk on a road. I’m sorry if his passing is upsetting for you.”

Again, Stiles scuffs and again, his mother gives him a reprimanding look and couples it with a slight swat to the back.

“No, Harris wasn’t a close friend, but the knowledge of his passing is a sad one.”

Stiles keeps his annoyance to a simple roll of his eyes, something that his mother seems to miss – or simply ignores – as she smiles at Derek, who seems to be a bit perplexed by the conflicting emotions the pair of them are showing. “I _am_ pleased to see a Hale has taken a seat on Council, however. I remember Talia Hale - I believe she was your mother? - a little bit, how is she?”

The smile returns to Derek’s face at the mention of his mother, making Stiles forget what he was angry about in order to stare at the complete transformation that expression gives Derek; he looks younger than Stiles originally thought and his joy at describing his family – he’s somehow managed to get off topic to his nieces and nephews – seems almost _childlike_.

Stiles doesn’t know what to _do_ with all that!

Eventually, Derek seems to exhaust all of his stories about his family, something that takes the better part of a day and has them moving into the house when the sun begins to set, and finally gets to the reason that he interrupted their solitude.

“There have been a few killings in the forest, not seeming to be for any other purpose than for the unnatural mangling of the animals.” Derek intones with all the grace of an undertaker, hands wrapped around the bowl in his hands like he’s trying to absorb the warmth from it.

(Stiles knows that he isn’t going to eat it; turns out that what Claudia was trying to brew _was_ dinner and after the first bite, and a barely hidden wince, Derek hadn’t done more with it than push bits around the bowl.

It doesn’t offend Stiles; while he loves his mother with all his heart, cooking _isn’t_ one of her strong suits, funnily enough…)

“What do you mean, ‘unnatural mangling’?” Stiles’ mother moves closer to him at that, reaching up and wrapping an arm around his shoulders. Surprised, but not wanting to brush off the gesture, Stiles leans into his mother’s embrace.

Derek’s eyes flicker between Stiles and his mother as he explains, “They seem to be almost… blown apart and more than a few organs seem to be missing, despite a search of the surrounding area. It has caused an uneasiness among the village and I offered to come here and see-”

“-and see if the vicious witches are ripping animals apart and bathing in their blood?” Stiles’ anger is back and his body tenses under his mother’s arm, her sharp “Stiles!” doing nothing to calm him.

Derek frowns at Stiles, but his voice is still even when he replies, “I came to see if either of you knew anything about what might have happened, or who might have caused it.”

“Because every witch knows about each other, whether they’re good or not, right? Doesn’t matter if you claim to be Dark or Light, does it?”

“Stiles, that is enough!” Claudia pushes away from her son and moves to sit across from Derek, pulling his uneaten stew toward her and pulling a few bits out of it before making her way to her cauldron in the corner of the room.

“Take Derek out for a walk and let me work for a few moments. I’m going to try to See what is doing this again, and I need utmost concentration.”

Stiles jerks his head toward the door and Derek rises stiffly to follow him, the ease that had been there when talking to Claudia completely gone. There is a part of Stiles that feels guilty about that, but his paranoia that Derek’s true colors are going to show up now that they are alone doesn’t let that part gain any ground.

They are only a few feet away from the cottage before Derek speaks, making Stiles flinch despite the fact that his voice is still in that even keel that he answered Stiles with at the table.

“Again?”

“What?” Stiles snaps, rubbing his hands over his shoulders at the look Derek gives him before the man frowns and turns away.

“Your mother. She said she would look for what was doing this ‘again’. What did that mean?”

“My father went looking into the Deep Forest for whatever it is that is causing this as well when my mother couldn’t See what the problem was, to begin with.” Stiles doesn’t like the way that Derek looks at him when he says that, so he immediately snaps, “They care about the village just as much as you do, despite your precious Council not even _trying_ to show any care for them!”

Derek clenches his hands into fists at that, a noise that suspiciously sounds like a growl rumbling from his throat, but before he can say anything, Claudia is calling out to them and cutting off his words.

“Nothing,” Claudia sighs, her eyes pinched in frustration to Stiles’ unasked question, “It did not take more than a moment to hit the Shadow blocking my Sight… I could barely even See past our little clearing and the village beyond us…”

Stiles swallows at the knowledge that his mother could no longer See his father anymore, his own anger at the helplessness he feels kicking up a breeze around their legs and does not stop until his mother lays a calming hand on his arm.

A clearing of a throat reminds him that there is more than just him and his mother dealing with this news. It makes Stiles want to scream at Derek to leave them alone, let them deal with this by themselves and tell Beacon to stick where the sun doesn’t shine.

Somehow realizing that he isn’t wanted right now, Derek softly excuses himself and leaves the clearing, making that feeling of somehow being off-kilter overcome Stiles again and he has a moment when he wishes that Derek had stayed so that he could yell at him, shove him, make some of this anger in his chest go _away_.

Pushing away from his mother’s calming hands, Stiles takes off into the woods surrounding the house, needing to lose himself and make the noise screaming in his head quiet down for a few hours…

He knows the perfect place.

 

* * *

 

Derek leaves the Stilinskis feeling no closer to an answer than when he first crested the hill their home stood upon, and more than a little thrown by the reaction that Stiles invoked in him the moment he laid eyes on the man…

It had been a bit unnerving, the feelings that he could smell on Stiles – and wasn’t that a curious name? - when he came up the hill; anger, frustration, protectiveness, impotence, fear, and a myriad of other sharp, bitter smells that almost had him stumbling in shock.

The sight of the man hadn’t helped matters either, making Derek even more confused by the slight frame, mole speckled skin, and a cupid’s bow mouth turned up into a snarl as whiskey brown eyes glared at him before Derek could even introduce himself.

The day continued to be a confusion, with Claudia being warm and welcoming to Derek, inviting him in and offering him food – although, that might have been a subtle threat in hindsight, given how wretched the food had tasted - while Stiles had simply stared at him like he could see into Derek’s soul, when he wasn’t throwing barbed words at him like his tongue was a sharpened blade…

It reminds him of what his mother said, about Stiles perhaps having a vendetta against the village, but being held in check because of his mother and father. Yet, Claudia and John can’t keep an eye on Stiles all the time, can they? With the bit of magic that Derek felt at the end of his visit, it would be no trouble at all for him to disappear at a moment’s notice and be gone before anyone-

Giving his head a hard shake, Derek pushes away that thought. Just because Stiles seemed to have a problem with him – or perhaps, the position he holds, given Stiles’ comments about Harris – does not mean that he automatically is the person that they’re looking for.

Derek promised his mother that he wouldn’t make any snap judgments, and that meant deciding Stiles’ fate just because the man rubbed him the wrong way…

Trying to stretch out the tension in his neck, Derek pays close attention to the surrounding area, listening for anyone that might have followed him or just happened to be traveling in this direction.

Other than a few bunnies trying to find mates in a bush a few feet to his left, Derek doesn’t hear anyone and sighs in gratitude as he begins to strip.

Shifting into his wolf form after a long, stressful day always helps him to relax and today is no different; almost as soon as Derek falls onto four paws, the negative emotions that he’s been carrying dim down to a more manageable level, his tail starting to wag as he takes in the sights and sounds of the forest around him.

Due to the villagers knowing nothing about the fact that a family of werewolves is living among them, Derek doesn’t get the chance to slip into his fur covered form as much as he’d like. Considering how the village reacted to even the slightest hint of danger, Derek can finally agree with his mother’s constant warning of caution.

Stretching out his limbs, Derek sniffs around his campsite for a few moments; his nose is always stronger in this form than when he’s human, so he might catch something now that he missed earlier…

The only thing he catches is the lingering scent of the Stilinski home on his clothes, something that strangely makes a happy rumble slip past his lips before he’s choosing a random direction and heading off through the trees.

There’s something very freeing about running around on four paws, with no real guide for yourself other than a random sense of direction and an interesting smell that also seems a little familiar…?

“Fuck _everything_!”

Derek pauses, body pressed close to the ground and ears pricked toward where the shout came from; that had sounded an awful lot like Stiles, and the last thing Derek wanted to do was get in the man’s way when he was already angry with Derek… for whatever reason.

Still, something makes Derek scot a bit closer, grunts and angry growls pointing out where exactly Stiles is, something that makes a low growl start to build in his chest. Did they not just spend the last few hours talking about how the forest was too dangerous right now?!? Did Stiles want to get captured, and possibly killed, by whatever it was that was haunting these woods?!?

**_Or_** , a dark part of Derek’s mind whispers, **_Stiles is the one doing the killings and that’s how he knows that there is nothing to fear here._**

Shaking his whole body, Derek moves a little closer and hides amid the brush as Stiles finally comes into view:

The man is throwing rocks and sticks in a rage, both his hands and his magic throwing them out from where Stiles is standing, so that there is a cleared circle where he stands. Sniffing the air surrounding him, Derek can detect a bit of sweat on Stiles’ body, telling him that the man has been at this for a while, probably ever since Derek left the Stilinskis and went back to his campsite…

It only lasts a few more moments before Stiles slumps in a heap in his cleared circle, his breaths skipping over his lips and a sour note entering his scent that almost has Derek moving from his hiding spot to comfort the man.

Thankfully, before Derek can do anything to give himself away, Stiles starts to mutter something under his breath, too low for Derek to hear… The cadence seems to be some sort of mantra and whatever it is, it seems to be calming Stiles enough that he pushes himself to his feet after only a few recitations of it.

With a heavy sigh, Stiles begins to gather up all the herbs and plants that have been uprooted or trampled during his fit, a steady muttering of everything that had been bothering him flowing from him like water from a stream as he went about his upkeep.

Derek learned about Stiles’ frustration that the village sent a representative as soon as his father was out of sight, the anger at the fact that – despite the eighteen years that said otherwise – as soon as there was trouble, Beacon immediately suspected Stiles or his mother as being the cause behind it.

There were also a few new, interesting curses that Derek learned sitting there listening to Stiles, something that made him chuff out the wolf equivalent of a laugh when Stiles said them.

The gathering had lead Stiles closer to Derek than he expected by the time the man was finished, so close that all Derek really had to do was stretch his neck and he could scent the back of Stiles’ hand…

Thankful for the coming twilight that keeps him in shadow, Derek presses as close to the ground as he possibly can, wondering where these strange urges were coming from and if there was any way he could get them to _stop_.

For a moment, Stiles simply sits in front of Derek, fingers sifting through the flora in his lap. Derek watches as the digits gently separate two stems from where they were wrapped around each other, wondering how long Stiles has been doing this to gain such care and dexterity in his movements…

Stiles pushing himself to his feet almost startles Derek into moving; as it is, he just digs his paws into the ground and swallows the yip that tries to escape, holding himself as still as possible when Stiles’ gaze snaps to the slight rustle Derek’s movement causes.

It feels like Stiles can still see him, no matter the fact that human eyes would be nearly blind in this light. The way he stares into the brush makes Derek feel exposed… and slightly guilty, like he intruded on something he wasn’t meant to see.

It could have been hours, moments, or merely a few beats of Derek’s heart before Stiles finally turns away, his pile of herbs held almost like one would an infant against his chest. Derek waits a few moments more, ears pricked for any kind of sudden movement before he crawls out from his hiding place and makes his cautious way back to camp.

Shifting back and dressing slowly, Derek sets a pail of water to boil as he thinks about what he just saw:

It seems like Stiles has a fair bit of anger coiled up inside of him but doesn’t use it to lash out at anyone. Instead, he goes out to the forest and releases against the plants and rocks underneath his feet.

Does that mean the animals were simply a byproduct of that rage?

No, it doesn’t seem so… Stiles had smelt genuinely angered by the thought that he (or his mother) were responsible for their deaths, or the gruesome way that they had died… Even the anger that Derek had seen had seemed controlled and precise, only reaching out like a small tornado, with Stiles at the center.

Pouring the rest of his dinner into the pail, Derek tries to focus on the meeting with Claudia and Stiles together, instead of the release of tension that he saw later. It wouldn’t do to get caught up with the control that Stiles executed, even while angry, and the way that he almost seemed like a sprite or some sort of Fae with the wind whirling around him like that…

Giving his head a shake, Derek makes a promise to himself; tomorrow, he will focus completely on assessing Claudia and Stiles, instead of getting drawn in by the welcoming way Claudia interacted with him and the fact that, despite an almost overwhelming anger that the village Derek represented, Stiles never raised a hand against him in harm.

It was a little hard to see the danger that Beacon swore dwelled here, but Derek was willing to give them the benefit of the doubt, despite something in his gut telling him they were dead wrong…

Derek quietly finishes cooking his meal and eats it in the same silence, too wrapped up in his thoughts to notice a pair of glimmering eyes watching his every move.


	4. The Truth (One Of Them) Is Revealed

“Well, since you seemed to have already made up your mind about us, I doubt anything I have to say will do us any good! So, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go do strange and depraved things in the woods! Be sure to let Beacon know as soon as you leave!”

Stiles can hear his mother calling for him as he stomps off, but his anger has too tight a hold on him to answer and he doesn’t look back as he breaks through the treeline.

Today had _not_ been a good day…

It hadn’t helped matters that, as soon as he had returned from his jaunt into the woods last night, his mother had immediately berated him for how he had acted with Derek and informed him that she knew she taught him better, warning him that when he started treating Derek better, there would be no ‘pigtail pulling’ while she was around, either.

Stiles had been embarrassed about her insinuation, as well as how chaotic he had been feeling towards someone that came from the village that reviled and hated him, so he had simply thrown himself up the loft to his bed and pulled the covers over his head when his mother called up to him.

The morning hadn’t been any better.

Claudia had apparently realized that she had stumbled upon something that Stiles did not want to talk about, and – being his mother and having a bit of a mischievous streak in her – had decided to tease him a bit about it, asking if her being there was what making Stiles so confrontational and offering to leave for the day if Derek showed up again.

Needless to say, Stiles wasn’t in the best of moods when Derek _did_ show up.

The man hadn’t helped matters by being completely cordial to Stiles and his mother, but still watching them closely, almost as if he expected them to brandish spells and curses if he so much as blinked.

It rubbed at Stiles’ nerves, this careful and almost _fearful_ consideration, especially so after the warm way that Derek was with him and (mostly) his mother only yesterday. Feeling like he was being mocked never ended well, and Stiles was snapping at Derek before he knew it, despite promising his mother that he would be kinder to the man.

However, due to another twist that set Stiles’ teeth on edge, Derek didn’t back down as he had before. Instead, the man had coolly informed Stiles that he was there because the Beacon High Council wanted to make sure that their residents were safe and that was what Derek was going to do.

Cornered and thrown, Stiles had blown up at that, all fond feelings thrown to the wayside as the disappointment that Derek was _just like Harris_ made itself known, and he’s now in the middle of the forest, cursing everyone in Beacon and wishing boils on uncomfortable places on all of them.

 _Especially_ a stubborn ass of a Hale who had the _gall_ to look hurt when Stiles had yelled at him!

Growling under his breath, Stiles makes his way to his favorite clearing, pausing for a moment when he hears the padding of feet following him.

It’s not unusual for a variety of animals to pass by this clearing, with Stiles being a common enough occurrence that they know he will bring them no harm, but this is the first time that an animal has ventured close enough for Stiles to hear them…

…and this one seems to be taking pains to _make sure_ that it is heard.

So, Stiles watches and waits, wondering what kind of animal is coming to see him and whether or not he should be concerned that something has bewitched or possessed the creature to harm him.

He can’t detect any residual magic in the air, but he also doesn’t lower his guard as the beast finally enters the clearing.

And what a beast it is…

Stiles blinks as he takes in the creature – a wolf – as it slowly walks towards him; it comes to Stiles’s waist where he stands, far larger than any other wolf that he has ever seen near the glen, and has fur a deep, dark ebony. Its eyes are a brilliant sapphire that seem to regard Stiles in the same manner that Stiles is regarding him, and as soon as the wolf comes within a few feet of Stiles, he sits on his rump with a little woof of sound.

Almost as if the beast is saying ‘hello’…

“Hello, there…” Stiles wonders why he’s whispering, then decides to not question what his mother liked to call ‘gut instincts’ as he continued to gaze at the wolf sitting across from him.

(His father likes to call them ‘the-reasons-I-have-gray-hairs’, but Stiles is ignoring that right now.)

“I haven’t seen you in these woods before. Are you what’s making the villagers act like Hell just opened up on their doorstep?”

The wolf growl-huffs like it’s insulted and Stiles just has to laugh at the thought that he – a quick check tells Stiles the wolf is male, with the animal curling his tail around himself like he’s affronted by Stiles’ curiosity – can understand what Stiles is saying. Still, it doesn’t keep Stiles from slowly standing and tilting his head along the pathway, a small smile curving his lips as he watches the wolf follow his lead.

“I need to get some herbs for my mother while I’m out here, do you want to join me?”

With a full-bodied shake, the wolf raises up, his tail wagging almost in encouragement.

Shaking his head at the way he’s seeing the humanism in an animal, Stiles starts heading through the woods, deciding that there are enough magic and charms floating on the air in this forest, that a wolf gaining a few human characteristics isn’t really _that_ strange.

With that in mind, Stiles immediately begins telling the wolf about himself; the fact that he lives with his mother and father, that John is a master hunter (with a quick aside that he never hunts animals when they already have food, as the wolf had seemed to tense up when he heard the word ‘hunter’) and the unwanted presence of one Derek Hale.

“He’s an absolute _asshole_ , acting like he isn’t there just so that he can tell the villagers that the ‘horrible witches’ are doing what they’re told,” Stiles grumbles as he uproots some feverfew, the wolf huffing beside him as he sniffs among the plant’s roots. “I’m half tempted to make it so that he has boils in uncomfortable places, so that the next time he's, heh, with a lady friend, he has a bit of explaining to do.”

The wolf growls at that, but it’s not like the other noises that he’s made… This one sounds angry and Stiles feels the first hint of danger from his animal companion, even more so when Stiles chances a glance over to the wolf and sees his lips curled over a rather impressive row of fangs.

“Hey, relax, wolf! I’m not going to do it anyway! He’d have to drink the concoction and I doubt he’d just down anything I’d give him-” The growling growing in volume cuts Stiles off and he throws up his hands in surrender. “Kidding! Just kidding! I’m not going to do anything, I promise.”

The wolf lets out a little snort at that before going back to sniffing at whatever it was that caught his attention before, letting Stiles to mutter “What in the name of the Goddess just happened?!?” to the creature’s back.

There’s almost absolute silence for a few moments, Stiles digging in the earth and the wolf’s snuffling the only noises for a decent while before Stiles can’t take the quiet anymore and begins to name off the ways he’s going to use the sage he’s digging up now.

The wolf noses at the plants thrust out at him and then begins to add his own claws to the extraction process, the unease from before already gone under the companionable way they work together.

 

* * *

 

Derek fights off the urge to rub at his forehead, already feeling a pain behind his eyes as Stiles makes another backhanded comment about whether or not Derek is going to string him up from the nearest tree, and slowly blows out a breath as he tries to fight his rising temper.

It’s been more than a week since he had first come up to check on Claudia and Stiles, and three days since he started joining Stiles on his walks through the forest, and he’s no closer to understanding Stiles than when he first started.

It wasn’t that he thought that Stiles was the one leaving mutilated animals closer and closer to Beacon’s borders, making the villagers more and more anxious as time went by. On the contrary, Claudia and Stiles were the furthest from Dark Witches that Derek had ever seen, Stiles’ temper notwithstanding. As a matter of fact, Derek could have ended these ‘reviews’ _days_ ago, but there _was_ a Dark Witch about and it didn’t sit right with Derek that Stiles and Claudia were up here unprotected.

(Not that he thought Claudia or Stiles were weak, or that he would feel any different if John was there. It was just that there was this nagging feeling at the base of his skull whenever Derek left for his campsite that always had him returning the following day.)

Claudia had seemed to accept his presence with good grace, although her knowing smiles and tendency to point out where Stiles was whenever Derek came upon her first told him that her kindness might have a hidden agenda to it… as well as the fact that some of the comments she makes have him thinking that she knows about his secret…

Stiles, on the other hand, seemed to take Derek’s visits as some sort of personal insult.

No matter how Derek has tried to talk with him, ask him about his work, or inquire about the herbs that he had helped gather as a wolf, Stiles always turned the conversation around on him and made Derek feel like he was standing on shifting sand with no steady ground in sight.

The fact that Claudia had rebuked Stiles for his words more than once had done nothing to stop them and Derek was at his wits end on what he could possibly have done to make the man hate him so.

So far, it had seemed like the mere fact that he called Beacon his home had damned Derek in Stiles’ eyes.

“I can’t believe what I’m hearing! There’s _no way_ that I’m going to go to one of the villager’s homes!” Stiles looks at Derek like the idea is the ravings of a madman and it causes the ache in his temple to throb in time with his heartbeat. “Knowing them, the bitch may poison me in the hope that Beacon’s witch problem will finally be solved!

He doesn’t know why that is the breaking point – perhaps because the villager he had named was a rather shy and sweet girl that had never said anything ill of anyone - but Derek suddenly can’t take the abuse upon Beacon anymore and he pushes back from the table hard enough that there is a worrying skip in Stiles’ heart.

Ignoring the way that it makes him want to apologize, Derek instead grits his teeth and growls out, “I have had just about enough of you dishonoring people who have never done anything to you. You have _no right_ to speak of-”

“’Never done anything to me’? ‘ _Never_ done anything to _me_ ’?” The laugh that follows those words is cruel and quick, making Derek blink in surprise, even as a sharp smirk splits Stiles’ face. “They have done _plenty_ , Hale, and _you’re_ the one that has no rights here! Do you even know _why_ they sent you up to these damn hills?!?”

“They were frightened by the animal attacks and wanted to make sure-”

“No.” Stiles’ hand makes a slashing motion, once more cutting off what Derek was going to say and making him feel even more frustrated than before. Stiles continues before he can speak, though, and Derek can do no more than listen after the first few words.

“They have done this every year, _every **year**_ , that we have lived in these woods. Every. Single. Year! It always falls on the days that my father leaves for his hunts because they know that if they try to spill their filth in his ears, they’d be lucky to leave here with all of their limbs.”

Stiles’ gaze drops to the table, his hands clenched into white-knuckled fists and Derek is struck with a sudden urge to reach out, to calm and comfort.

He doesn’t, though. Instead, he puts his arms across his chest in an attempt to keep from giving in to such urges as Stiles breathes in deep to continue.

“Harris was the worst of them, coming up here to ‘check up’ on my mother and me, to ‘make sure we were all right’ with my father gone. As soon as my mother left to get him something to eat, or turned her back to work on something at the cauldron, he would whisper the most _awful_ things in my ear… I was _six years old_ the first time it happened…”

Derek bites back the growl that wants to slip out as he imagines all the things that Harris could have said that put the haunted expression on Stiles’ face and, for the first time since he heard the news, Derek finds that he’s glad that the man is dead.

“What did he say?”

Stiles jerks at that, gaze snapping up to meet Derek’s like he’s surprised that he’s still there. Derek, on the other hand, is a little surprised himself; that wasn’t what he wanted to say, he wanted to offer some sort of apology, but now that it’s out there, he doesn’t take the words back.

Stiles closes his eyes and breathes deeply a few times, a look on his face like he’s reliving one of his worst nightmares. Derek is just on the verge of telling him that he doesn’t have to say anything when Stiles opens his eyes again.

“He told me not to fear because the village was working on making sure that I was taken away from the horrible witch that no doubt stole me from some poor fools she killed. That, as soon as they were able, they would burn her down to nothing and then spread her ashes across a running river… so that her soul would never find rest and she’d be forever tormented for her crimes.”

Stiles tries to smile, in an attempt to make either Derek or himself feel better is unclear, but the motion is more effort than he can seem to give and it drops soon enough.

“I started wailing the first time, making my mother come running and sweeping me up into her arms. As soon as I realized who it was that was holding me, I started babbling about how I didn’t want her to burn, I didn’t want to be taken away…My breathing started to get shorter and shorter the longer I went on and I don’t remember much of what happened after that. I was too upset to pay attention to anything _but_ her for the next few days, but I _do_ remember that the following years had Harris being a little more subtle about what they were going to do when they had the chance, as well as promising to ‘fix’ whatever it was that made me feel pity for a demon.”

The cracking of the fire is the only sound for a few heartbeats.

Derek couldn’t understand how anyone would look at Claudia Stilinski – the lady that tried to feed him every time he came by, despite being _terrible_ at it, and the one who told him to keep trying with Stiles; that _she_ liked him, so her son would come around – and see a monster…

It just wasn’t possible.

Stiles is the one to push to his feet this time, and Derek can only watch as he squares up his shoulders and pushes away the vulnerability that was there only seconds ago. Derek tries to speak past the lump in his throat, to reassure Stiles that such things will never come to pass, not if Derek has anything to say about it, but all he manages is a weak, “Stiles…”

For his part, Stiles simply shakes his head and makes his way to the door, stopping only to pin Derek with a look that feels like a blade in his ribs.

“That _village_ ,” Stiles spits the word like it’s the worst curse one can think of, grimacing even as his mouth shapes the letters, “isn’t _worried_ for us, they’re _scared_ of us. Despite _eighteen years_ of protection and remedy, they _still_ believe that I or my mother would harm them, simply because we hold power they do not. They would throw us to the wolves if it would save their own necks and while I hold _nothing_ but _contempt_ in my heart for them, I would rather _chop off my own hand_ than do _anything_ that makes them want to hurt my mother.”

Derek swallows as Stiles leans in, his amber eyes seeming to pull Derek in the longer he looks at them, unable and unwilling to look away.

“There’s a reason we live so far away, Hale. A reason that my father never tried to convince my mother to try to move to Beacon. Maybe you should think about _that_ instead of trying to make me welcome people who have done nothing but frighten and disregard me and mine for my _entire life_.”

With those words, Stiles is gone, leaving Derek to drop back to the table in front of him with his head in his hands and the feeling like his world has been violently tipped on its axis.


	5. Interlude

John has never liked venturing this far into the Deep Forest, with all manner of Dark creatures rustling in the trees and brushes, every skitter and call setting every nerve on edge…

Claudia has said, more than once, that the creatures in this part of the Forest weren’t necessarily _Dark_ , but it was that their lives demanded more viciousness from them than the creatures that live closer to home. John knows that she’s right, she has more knowledge on this type of thing then he does after all, but he still grew up in Beacon and there are a few things that are hard to just stop believing in… especially being surrounded by it as he is.

No matter the case, John keeps a tight hand on his bow as he makes his way to the clearing just past where the Deep Forest meets the woods he calls home, knowing that whatever it is that was making mutilations of those animals, had to pass through there at some point.

As he makes his way to the clearing, his thoughts wander to his wife and son, hoping that they are well and that Harris hasn’t been his usual unpleasant self to Stiles.

John is well aware that there is something about that man that upsets Stiles and has kept a close eye on him ever since he came home when Stiles was young to his little boy crying and screaming that he didn’t want his mother to be burned, Claudia at her wits end on what to do.

It was pretty simple to see that something Harris had said had upset Stiles, and while both John and Claudia were open enough about their religions to encourage Stiles to find his own walk in life, Harris had a zealot-like fervor about him that had sent more than one child into a fit of tears.

(And that had nothing on the suspicion John had that Harris had a _particular_ interest in Claudia, in what she could do and how that could benefit him. John had caught the man looking at her in town more than once, in a way that said Harris was thinking about more than just her immortal soul, and John had been careful to not leave her alone with him after that as well.)

Both Claudia and John had been civil with Harris because of Stiles, and John had been a bit standoffish when the man had invited him to drinks because of Stiles _and_ Claudia, so it sufficed to say that their relationship with the man was cold at best, tolerated at worst…

Shaking his head to keep from wandering down dark thoughts, John reminds himself that his wife is a more than capable hedge witch and that Stiles needs only to _think_ that his mother is in trouble to come to her aid.

They were going to be _fine_.

Either way, John really needed to focus right now, as he had just made it to the clearing and what he was seeing really needed his full attention…

The clearing that marked the true border between Beacon’s woods and the Deep Forest was much like any other clearing; a conglomerate of wild growing things, a small pond bubbling from some underground well, and a plethora of towering trees that circle the place like a barrier.

The hairs on the back of John’s neck stand to attention as he takes in the felled trees laying like slain bodies in front of him, the lush and green land now molded and decaying, and a thick putrid smell coming from the water that looks almost as black as tar pushing against the ground around it.

Swallowing heavily, John takes a few steps into the clearing as the wind slowly rustles through his hair and then falls still… There is no sound, save for the dry cracking underneath his feet; no birds, no animals, nothing to even hint at a sign of life…

Well, there is _one_ sign of life; a heart thundering out a desperate rhythm that makes it hard for John to breathe, for him to do anything but give into the dread crawling up his back, yet he pushes on. He needs to find out what did this, what it wants, and how he can protect his family from it.

Taking a deep breath, John moves another step forward into the clearing.

His eyes scan the ground around him, trying to pick out a trail of whatever it was that caused all of this, and he wishes that he could ignore the way that the pond bubbles and gurgles as if there was something just beneath the surface, trying to get out. John quickens his searching, a chill creeping over his body the longer he stays, a primal voice in his head warning him that his chances of leaving this clearing alive are getting lower and lower every second he’s still here-

He almost misses it, the sudden jump the foliage takes when his toe hits the item makes John stifle a shout as he scampers backward, almost falling over his feet.

Taking a few gasping breaths, John slowly moves forward and takes another look at the item that seems to be catching a non-existent light and once he sees what it is, what it means, he is once more tripping over his feet to get out of the meadow, to get back home.

It was worse than the villagers thought; this wasn’t some animal or a poor deranged soul that needed someone to show him the right path…

This was something that Claudia only spoke of _once_ and in whispers, eyes darting around and hands fluttering in protective symbols as if the very utterance of the thing might summon it to their doorstep, something that she had made him promise to never ask of her again and John, horrified by the desperation and outright _fear_ in her tone, had wished he had never asked the question in the first place.

The wind kicks up again as John runs, a sudden scattering of pheasants taking to the air as if they have caught the fear that runs through him, as if they, too, wish to put as much distance between them and the horror that was that clearing as they possibly can.

For, sitting in the middle of what John now knows is a summoning circle, was a human skull.

A human skull impaled with sharp objects that seemed to be bleeding red lines from where they were punctured, lines of black ink dancing all along the entirety of the head. The grass and plants immediately underneath it are little more than ash and ooze, mixed together in a poisonous spill.

Human skulls were always Dark totems, the killing of another something that forever tarnished your soul, and the skulls that did _that_ to a clearing were the Darkest of all. It was _always_ the symbol for something that went _beyond_ a Dark Witch…

It was the symbol… of a Darach.

 

* * *

 

Claudia rubs her hands over her arms, frowning up at the clear blue sky as a sudden chill overtakes her, an uneasy feeling of foreboding settling in her stomach despite the pleasant day.

“I sincerely doubt that  _anything_  you say would be interesting enough for me to listen to.”

“Maybe it would be if you  _actually_  listened to me.”

Claudia sighs heavily as she makes her way out of her house, letting the raising voices lead her to where the boys are.

Perhaps it isn’t as _quite_ as pleasant as she originally thought…

Something had happened the last time that Derek visited their humble abode, something that makes the man look at Stiles like a kicked puppy and scent the air every time Stiles’ back is turned.

(She _really_ needs to have a word with Talia about Derek’s subtlety; she could pick up on his furrier aspects almost as soon as the boy had walked across her threshold, _especially_ with the way that he kept sniffing after her boy like he was the tastiest hunk of meat at the butcher shop, and it was only because Stiles was so focused on hating Derek rather than talking to him that _he_ hasn’t noticed!)

And her son! He’s being defensive in a way that says he admitted something he didn’t want to, and it makes Claudia want to smack him upside the head. If he would just _look_ at Derek, look at the _man_ and not what he represents, then Claudia is sure that there is the potential for something _wonderful_ there.

Something a lot like what she has with John…

(Another shiver runs over her frame, making Claudia curse whatever it is that is blocking her Sight and speeds up her steps so that she can at least see that _one_ of the people she loves is healthy and happy.

“Why do you care so much about me listening to you, anyway?”

“Maybe I’m just tired of you looking at me like I’m the Devil reincarnate…

“I don’t… I don’t look at you like that…”

“Maybe you should tell your eyes that!”

Well… healthy, at least.

There’s a bit of silence after that statement, and Claudia finally makes it around the corner just in time to see Stiles and Derek very pointedly _not_ looking at each other, similar expressions of embarrassed stubbornness on their faces.

She sighs again. Those boys… Honestly!

“Hello, Derek.” Claudia greets, trying to see if she can somehow calm the tension that she can feel between the boys, knowing that they are just one wrong word from toppling the tentative peace that Derek has been trying to build for the past few days.

Stiles, as obstinate as he may be, _has_ realized that Derek isn’t like the other villagers and has been opening up to him a little bit, his knee-jerk reactions to any mentions of Beacon besides the point. Even _he_ would be upset if something he said ended up driving Derek off for good!

_Especially_ when she thinks about the looks that Stiles has been giving Derek, the glances that he almost looks angry at himself for, but can’t seem to stop… The confusion whenever Derek hasn’t been raising to his words anymore like he misses the debates that they used to get into.

That might be the reason that Stiles has been pushing harder when Derek has been over, even going so far as to make up things the poor boy has done to growl at him about!

“-I was just trying to speak with Stiles for a few moments, but it seems like he’s mad at me. Again.” Derek voice breaks into her thoughts as he sends a look Stiles’ way, something that makes Stiles narrow his eyes at him, before continuing with, “Apparently, my _eyes_ have somehow offended him this time.”

“Well, they are a rather interesting shade of green, so-”

“They’re not green, Mom! They’re almost every color under the sun because _Mr. Representative_ over here can’t pick a single color!” Stiles bites out, surprising both her _and_ Derek (she sees the little flinch of his shoulder out of the corner of her eye) when he brandishes a frustrated hand in Derek’s direction. “They’re only green around the outer part of the orb, but when you get closer to the center they start fading into blue, then there’s a bit of… gold… around… the iris…”

Stiles trails off as he seems to realize just what he said, Derek is grinning at him in a completely _different_ way than he has with Claudia and- oh…

_Oh_!

“Well, I was coming over here to let you know, Stiles, that I’m going to go get the herbs we need for today and-”

“No!” Stiles blurts, already spinning on his heel and darting off for the woods, not even pausing when he hollers over his shoulder, “I’ll get them. You just- _Both of you_ just… stay here!”

Claudia shakes her head as she watches his rapidly departing form, wondering when her boy will realize that they don’t really need any herbs, seeing as he has been bringing in more than ever before (and she has a certain idea of why…).

Also, her plan to leave Stiles and Derek alone, seeing as the pair of them _really_ needed to talk, has failed. Drat.

“I think I also should be heading out, Mrs. Stilinski. Will I see you tomorrow?”

“Of course,” Claudia turns to give Derek another soft smile, waiting until he begins to walk away before asking, “But it really isn’t _me_ that you’ve been coming to see, now is it?”

It’s immensely satisfying to see a full-grown man trip over his own feet, more so when he’s a supernatural creature that can run faster than the average man and snap a flying bird out of the air. Claudia is pretty sure that she can be excused for the giggles that burst out of her mouth at the way Derek’s shoulders go up around his ears when he straightens himself.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Mhm…” Claudia’s hum is entirely unconvinced. “Just like I don’t know about your ability to don a fur coat and follow my son around the woods, while helping gather the supplies we need, right?”

Derek stares at her for a few moments, brows curved into an unhappy line before he once more turns on his heel and makes his way into the woods surrounding their house.

Claudia tried not to giggle again, but this time at the fact that Derek is heading in the exact direction that Stiles had run off in.

By the stiffing of Derek’s retreating shoulders, she doesn’t do a very good job.


	6. A New Player

Derek was acting weird.

Stiles isn’t surprised by the difference, given how the man had looked when Stiles told him exactly _why_ he hated the people of Beacon so much, but he also didn’t expect this… _caution_ either.

It’s completely different from the way Derek acted in the beginning, that first day where he was warm and welcoming, only to be watchful and suspicious the next. It’s an almost… worried aura, like Derek is making every move with the cautious decision not to veer too close into Stiles’ space.

It’s **_frustrating_**!

Stiles didn’t tell him about his experiences with Beacon that for Derek to act like Stiles was some sort of dandelion fluff, easily blown over by the slightest breeze! It makes his words come harsher than ever at Derek’s next two visits, making them the shortest that the man has ever been at the Stilinski residence.

His mother has taken to sighing at him whenever Stiles vents his frustrations about Derek, so Stiles has been spending more and more time with his wolf lately.

“It’s annoying,” Stiles remembers saying, digging off some willow bark with a bit more force than what was strictly needed. “You think that someone that attractive would be less of an asshole…”

There was a sudden thump following his words and when Stiles has looked over to his animal companion, he saw the wolf pulling himself off the forest floor and shaking off his body in a way that would look embarrassed if he had been human.

“What happened to you?”

All he had received in response was a slightly sharp ‘woof’ before the wolf had started nosing at Stiles’ tree, as if to say, ‘never mind that, get back to what you were doing’, so Stiles had shrugged and went back to his work, complaining about Derek the entire time.

It wasn’t the first time that Stiles had thought the other man was attractive, simply the first time that he had said it out loud. Stiles, while still wanting nothing to do with anything Beacon, still had noticed the way Derek moved and spoke, the sweet smile that he gave Stiles’ mother and the way he at least _tried_ to force down a few bites of Claudia’s cooking.

It was making it really hard to hate the man…

More so when, after he had made it home and put up with his mother’s sly comments on how many times Stiles had stared at Derek’s butt the previous day, Derek showed up and spent the entire time either blushing or staring at Stiles. Only to blush even _more_ when Stiles caught him at it!

“Is there something in the water?” Stiles had demanded of his mother after Derek had spent nearly ten minutes stammering out a goodbye that had composed of either meeting or very pointedly _not_ meeting Stiles’ eye.

Claudia had simply chuckled and warned him that he might want to be careful about what he told people in the future. His bemused comment that he only really told her or his father any of his secrets was met with a full-on belly laugh.

Sometimes, his mother was a little strange…

While that was neither here nor there, Stiles had still been a little thrown by Derek’s caution around him, making him snappy and irritable whenever he had to deal with Derek’s stubbled face…

…which was upsetting _Derek_ if the pinched brows and small frowns that graced his face when he thought Stiles wasn’t looking were any clue.

Stiles didn’t know what to do with that!

What was he supposed to _say?_

“Stop treating me like one harsh word is going to send me into hysterics”?

“I hate that you’re treating me differently now.”

“I don’t _want_ you to treat me different, now that you know what Beacon thinks of me. Argue with me! Stand up to me! Don’t treat me like I’m-”

_Something inconvenient. Or broken…_

Stiles cut off that thought before it can take root, a little shaken that Derek’s perspective of him meant so much in such a brief time…

It had been almost a month since Stiles had seen that ebony head wandering up to their hill, and part of him is already dreading the day that Derek decides they’re ( _he’s_ ) too much trouble and stops coming altogether.

It’s something that he hasn’t mentioned to his mother (although he thinks that she knows, somehow) _or_ his wolf, the one… creature? that he has been telling nearly everything to, head tipped like he’s drinking up every word Stiles speaks.

Sighing heavily, Stiles makes his way to what he’s starting to think of as ‘their’ – his and the wolf’s – clearing, dropping down by the stream and scooping up a handful of water to wet his throat.

Hearing a rustle behind him, Stiles smiles down at his reflection, thinking that his wolf friend (and he really needs to give him a name, if for no other reason than he can’t keep calling him ‘the wolf’ in his head. It’s boring and the one thing his wolf is _not_ , is _boring_ ) has decided to 'sneak up' on him.

The little ‘surprise attacks’ had started a few days ago, with his wolf suddenly bumping into him from behind to announce his presence, nearly knocking him over and making Stiles let out a cry as he instinctively let out a flash of his Spark in defense.

Thankfully, for both Stiles and his wolf, the flash was meant to startle rather than hurt and no harm came to his friend. The wolf was more careful about announcing his presence before knocking into Stiles from then on - something that Stiles feels a little embarrassed about - but after the initial shock, the wolf had seemed pretty interested in Stiles’ Spark and he had spent the next few minutes showing off with various colored lights dancing through his fingertips.

(It was surprisingly similar to the one time that Derek had seen Stiles’ magic; the man’s eyes had widened, and he looked almost _entranced_ by the way that Stiles had maneuvered his Spark in tandem with his mother. Stiles hadn’t been used to that kind of awe inspired by his magic and had quit only a few seconds later, as trying to work with his Spark when he was distracted tended to have… rather _disastrous_ results.)

Yet, that wasn’t something that he needed to think about right now; Stiles has a wolf friend to pay back for all the times he has surprised him.

Based on the twigs breaking behind him, the wolf is about three feet to his left and Stiles waits until he hears the animal break through the last of the underbrush before he spins on his heel with a shout on his lips…

…only to fall is flat on his ass in shock when a beautiful, pure white _unicorn_ comes walking out of the woods, alabaster horn gleaming in the sunlight as it turns its head slightly to study Stiles where he sits.

Stiles has heard stories about unicorns from his mother: legends and myths that say they are protectors and executioners both, able to see into the hearts of man and know if they are really as good as they appear to the rest of the world…

His breathing starts coming in terrified rasps as his fear that the village is  _right about him_  and that there is some sort of evil is in heart overwhelms him, making him think that he has somehow summoned one of the Great Unicorns to pass judgment-

His panic is cut off by the breath of air blown in his face, startling him by how close the unicorn is now, as a velvety nose presses against his forehead with a soft nicker. Stiles isn’t sure what he’s supposed to _do_ now, looking into sapphire eyes that seem to stare straight through to his soul, but decides to raise his hand after a few seconds and tentatively pet along the unicorn’s side.

The beast allows his touch for a few strokes, seemingly to show that she – a quick check before the unicorn’s horn is tapping him on the head like his mother does when he’s being rude – means him no harm, before moving back to the pond and starting to nibble on the grass there.

Of course, at this moment, Stiles hears something moving through the undergrowth and can only hysterically think, _By the Goddess, what **now**??_

 

* * *

 

Derek waits a few moments on the outskirts of their – his and Stiles’ – clearing as he tries to get his head on straight.

He… he may have a bit of a problem.

A problem by the name of Stiles Stilinski.

After hearing of the terrible way that Harris had treated Stiles, Derek had been hesitant to do, well, anything in regard to Stiles. The very last thing he wanted was something that he said or did reminding Stiles of the former representative and it seems to have made Stiles angrier than if he had simply outright insulted him.

It had become so bad that, during the single time that Derek had ever seen Stiles use his magic, as soon as Stiles had realized that Derek was staring, he had stopped and snapped at Derek that he wasn’t some freak show to be gawked at.

Derek had felt _horrible_ for making Stiles feel that way and had immediately left the cottage, only for Stiles to follow him out and rant at him for another five minutes about that not meaning Derek could just run away because magic made him uncomfortable since it was such a large part of their lives.

It hadn’t made him uncomfortable, though. Derek thought that Stiles’ magic was _beautiful_.

Derek thought _Stiles_ was beautiful.

Sighing heavily, Derek admits to himself that is the very root of his problem. Somewhere along the line, amid the pushing and pulling between the two of them, the fights and the small moments of peace, Derek had started to grow feelings for Stiles when the younger man seemed to hate the very air Derek breathed.

As a matter of fact, the only time that they seem to get along is when Derek is wearing a fur coat and walking on four paws… and that was probably because Stiles doesn’t realize that his wolf is actually _Derek_.

Letting out a small whine, Derek doesn’t know how to fix that… He knows that the way that he’s treating Stiles now is upsetting the man, and he plans on being a little less cautious the next time he meets with him as a human, but is there something else that he could do to make Stiles view him as something other than a representative of everything he hates?

If there is, then Derek doesn’t know what it is…

With another low whimper as he reflects on the options available to him, Derek decides that he will think more on the conundrum that is Stiles Stilinski when he makes it back to his camp and will instead focus on the few hours he has as-

A sudden, terrified heartbeat – a heartbeat he knows as well as his own - has Derek snapping out of his thoughts and bursting into the clearing without any conscious thought to do so.

Seeing Stiles sprawled on the grass and staring at a unicorn in shock, heart hammering like it’s trying to burst free from his chest has Derek growly lowly and his eyes burning as he immediately walks over to Stiles and plops himself over the man’s legs.

He’s not sure if Stiles saw the glimmer of his eyes, but right now he’s more focused on protecting him from what is no doubt an unjust judgment from one of the Great Unicorns and Derek _will not_ -

The sudden feeling of Stiles rubbing at one of his ears has Derek’s growling dimming just a smidge as Stiles states, “Easy there, big guy. She’s not here to hurt me. We already said hi before you got here. I’m more surprised by how protective you’re being!”

The comment reminds Derek that this is the closest that he has ever been to Stiles, as wolf or human, and he tries not to get overwhelmed by the scent of loam, sweat and the slightly electric charge that is Stiles’ magic and reminds Derek of how the wind changes right before a storm…

Letting out an annoyed huff at himself, Derek simply stares at the unicorn at the stream that is now looking back at him and ignores the bit of lore that says that they can tell if there is someone ‘in another skin’ around them as he settles more firmly on Stiles’ legs.

“Goddess, you’re as bad as Derek when it comes to listening to me!”

Derek _does not_ whine at that, at another reminder that his relationship with Stiles as a human seems doomed to failure, but his ears _do_ flatten against his head when the unicorn lets out a whinny that sounds suspiciously like a laugh afterward.

“Aw, come on, big guy!” Stiles teases, his fingers digging into a spot behind Derek’s ears that almost have his eyes rolling up into his head. “Don’t be such a Sourwolf!”

Derek lets out another rumble, annoyed that his protectiveness is something Stiles thinks he can laugh at.

“That’s it! Sourwolf!”

Derek’s head immediately jerks up and swivels around to look at Stiles, who is looking back at him with the _biggest_ grin on his face.

Oh no.

“What d’you say, big guy?”

No.

“Or should I say…”

This is not happening.

“ _Sourwolf_!”

Derek doesn’t care that he whines _out loud_ at that, he takes the arm of Stiles’ tunic in his mouth – his eyes really _do_ roll back into his head at the immediate taste of _Stiles_ on his tongue – as he growls deep and low in his throat.

Stiles simply _laughs_ at that!

“Nu-uh. You don’t fool me. You may act like a big and scary fierce-wolf, but you’re nothing but a big softy that would throw his body in front of a _unicorn_ for me and then be grumpy about being caught at it. You are now my Sourwolf, and you’re going to have to get used to it!”

Yup, that whinny was _definitely_ a laugh at his expense.

Derek would be offended, he _would_ ; he’s a strong predator that is the master of the forest whenever he goes hunting, and he’s the stealthiest of his family – including _Laura_! – and he has never been grumpy about anything in his entire life!

And yet…

Stiles seems so happy when he informed Derek of all of this and there is a tiny, completely unnoticeable, small part of Derek that is preening at the use of ‘my’ in that sentence, even though he knows that Stiles looks at the wolf as some sort of pet now. It still means that a part of Derek belongs and is loved by Stiles now.

So, despite the fact that Derek is a proud and majestic wolf, he feels like a happy little puppy under the insistent hands of Stiles as he continues to run his fingers through Derek’s fur and gush about how happy he is to finally have figured out what to call him, besides ‘the/that wolf’.

Stiles must sense his weakening resolve, because he immediately starts digging in deeper with his fingers, so much so that Derek is merely a pliant ball of fluff against his legs instead of the rigid guardian of a few moments pass.

“Oh, yeah, Sourwolf. Just give into the Stilinski charm. It’s useless to resist. I am more stubborn than the most bullheaded goat and you will not succeed against me when I pull out all the awesome reasons you should listen! Besides, you’ve already shown that you’re willing to defend me against a freaking _unicorn_ , there’s _nothing_ you wouldn’t do for me now, huh?”

Derek sighs in agreement, shifting so those talented fingers can get to that one itchy spot on his side.

There’s really _nothing_ that he wouldn’t do for Stiles Stilinski.

The whinny this time has a definite ‘pushover’ tone to it.


	7. Another Truth Is Told (Or Is It?)

“I’m not here because of the damn _village_ , Stiles!”

Stiles jerks back at the venom in Derek’s voice and even Claudia looks up in shock, but Derek is already moving away from them, stomping over to the boundary of their land and seeming to mutter what seems to be a string of curses, based on what Stiles can hear.

Looking over at his mother, all Stiles gets is an expression that says Claudia is staying out of it and that Stiles needs to go over and talk to Derek. Huffing out an exasperated breath, Stiles does just that.

It has been a tense few days…

While he had been trying to figure out how to tell Derek to stop treating him like a child about to fall at the slightest push, Derek had apparently realized that he was acting like a complete ass and started acting the way that he had when they first met.

Stiles had been hesitant about trusting Derek, convinced that this was some ploy to get him to lower his guard, but Derek had continued to act considerately towards Claudia when Stiles was away-

(His mother wasn’t the only one who could See, although it took Stiles a reflective surface to get a clearer glimpse instead of just focusing on a distant spot. Like a lake, or a watering trough… or a dusty old mirror that your mother catches you with because the spell was only pointed toward one person and not the one whose sneakier than a certain Sourwolf when coming up behind you…)

-and Stiles was starting to relax a little more around Derek, making the comment that he wished more of the villagers that showed up acted the same way Derek did, considering that would make Stiles feel a whole lot better about the lot of them.

He had expected Derek to be pleased or make his own comment about how Stiles could do with some personality changes as well, _not_ for Derek to blow up at him and go stomping off!

Those very words are on the tip of his tongue when Derek suddenly spins on his heel, making Stiles jump again, this time because he wasn’t aware that he had been making that much noise…

Derek sees the flinch that skips across Stiles’ shoulders and his brows get extra frowny – if there was something this past month has taught him, is that Derek is just as expressive with his brows as his words, and that sometimes all it took was a look at how they were furrowed to get a sense of Derek’s mood – before he straightens his shoulders like he’s about to go off to war.

A stone starts to settle in Stiles’ stomach as a nasty voice in the back of his head begins to whisper, “ _This is it. This is the moment that he tells you that he’s done dealing with you and he’s **never coming back** -_”

“I haven’t come here in on official business for the past few weeks… since the first visits, actually.”

For a few blissful seconds, the voice in Stiles’ head is completely silent. It’s the perfect time for Stiles to ask, “What?”

Derek rolls his eyes like he’s frustrated he has to repeat himself, but Stiles can see the blush coming into bloom on his cheeks as he picks a spot just over Stiles’ shoulder to stare at.

“I’ve only needed the first couple of visits to see that you and your mother weren’t anywhere near Dark Witches and that Beacon’s citizens were simply letting their fear get the better of them. I kept coming because you were being a little shit, at first, and I wanted to show you that I wasn’t going to be run off by a bad attitude.”

Derek gives Stiles a little grin at this point like they have an inside joke, but Stiles is busy feeling slightly gob-smacked right now, so he can’t really return it. Derek’s grin dies at that and he goes back to staring over Stiles’ shoulder.

“After… after you told me about how Harris treated you, I could understand how you treated me the way you did, how you didn’t trust me. I thought about leaving you alone after that, but I didn’t want- it didn’t seem right to just leave you thinking I was anything like- I haven’t mentioned the village since and you still seemed determined to hate- you still seemed uncomfortable around me and I’m running out of ideas to try to show you _that I’m on your side_.”

Stiles is pretty sure that his jaw is a couple of inches past the dirt under his feet now, as that is the most words that he has _ever_ heard Derek say and it almost sounded like-

At least, Stiles _hoped_ it sounded like-

“Do you want to see what a protective circle looks like when it’s being cast?”

Derek’s gaze jerks up to his, a frown nearly making his eyebrows turn into one giant fuzzy caterpillar. Stiles tries not to laugh at that, as that hadn’t been what he meant to say, but he’s going to stick with it when he remembers the awed look on Derek’s face when he had the barest glimpse of what Stiles could do.

“You… you want to show me that?”

Stiles shrugs like it’s no big deal, glad that Derek can’t hear the way that his heart is beating, and simply begins to move his hands in the beginning incantation of his preferred spell.

He can hear a small gasp to his right as a light begins to glow in the center of his palm, a bright white that pulses in time with Stiles’ heartbeat as he mutters the words that ask protection from the Goddess with a promise to serve her by both action and words.

He doesn’t decide to change his intent for this spell until he turns and sees Derek’s face illuminated in the magic’s glow; his eyes are awed and completely entranced as they dart from the glow in Stiles’ hand to his face, a strange yearning flickering through his gaze when he sees Stiles looking back.

It only takes two steps before Stiles is standing in front of Derek, a soft whisper of a promise as he presses his hand against Derek’s chest, the glow in his hand sinking almost effortlessly into the man’s tunic.

The heartbeat underneath his hand is a little faster than what Stiles is pretty sure is normal, and even Derek’s voice is a little rusty when he says, “I thought you said that it was a protection circle?”

It is. Protection, that is… I just changed it from an area… to just you.”

Derek’s eyes widen at that, his gaze dipping down to Stiles’ lips before snapping up to Stiles’ eyes, but Stiles doesn’t move, for fear of this all just being a lonely boy’s desperate need for more, and they slowly move apart as Stiles hears his mother calling for him from the cottage.

 

* * *

 

Derek pads over to the stream, the unicorn huffing at him as he takes a drink from the surprisingly cool water, pondering if he could get away with diving in to stave off the heat without Stiles teasing him later.

He decides against it when the unicorn huffs out a breath in his direction, almost like she’s annoyed that he’s taking up all the water. As if there isn’t an entire pool to drink from, oh no, Derek is in _her_ spot!

He’s also sure that she knows that he’s not an ordinary wolf; there have been moments when she’s outright glared at Derek, mostly whenever Stiles has made some sort of comment about his human half and Derek has huffed in satisfaction.

She does not appreciate Derek lying to Stiles like this and Derek is agreeing with her more and more as the days have gone by.

Today, though. Today is the day that he shows Stiles the truth and asks him if there is a chance of them being more than simply friends.

It’s been a few days since Stiles had given him that protection charm, something that had felt warm and comforting in a way that Derek had usually only felt around his family. He wasn’t sure if the spell was on him, or his tunic, so it might have been a while since he cleaned that particular item and he may or may not have slept with it under his pillow…

Shaking his head in a desperate attempt to dispel the images that followed that thought, namely what his tent would smell like if he actually had Stiles in there, instead of just the hint of him through his magic, Derek instead focuses on the sound of footsteps heading their way.

A low whine slips past his lips when he notices the slightly shuffling action that those feet are taking and even the unicorn seems upset as her head flickers over to where Stiles is entering the clearing.

Derek barks at Stiles, hoping that it might startle him out of whatever strange mood he’s in, but all Stiles does is give him a half smile before flopping onto the forest floor with a heavy sigh.

Looking at the unicorn like she might have some answers, and not surprised when he gets an annoyed look in return, Derek moves over to where Stiles is laying and gently noses at his arm as he also checks to make sure that there aren’t any wounds that he might have missed…

Stiles smells healthy, if a little sad, and his concern has finally managed to rouse Stiles from his splayed position with another heavy sigh.

“Derek stopped by today… well, I guess it would be news if I said that he didn’t come by today, but there was something different about this visit, something that I realized…”

For a moment, Derek is pretty sure that his heart has stopped, that Stiles has figured out that the wolf he knows and the man he barely tolerates are the same person before Derek could tell him… Stiles doesn’t seem to realize his inner turmoil, though, as he has reached out to run a hand over his fur.

“I think… I think that Derek has become important to me… and it so damn **_frustrating._** That _asshole_!”

This time, Derek is the one dropping to the floor as his legs seemed to have been cut off from under him, the unicorn no doubt whinnying at the sudden increase in pain that floods the clearing, a long whine slipping past Derek’s throat as he drops.

“I know you don’t know what I’m saying, but it’s nice that you care, Sourwolf,” Stiles sighs, completely unaware that he just ripped Derek’s heart from his chest and is just squeezing it with every sweet gesture he shows to his ‘Sourwolf’. “It’s nice to have someone to talk to about this, my mom keeps trying to get me to jump Derek, but there’s no way in all the Pits am I going to do anything like _that_!”

The unicorn has moved over to Derek’s other side at this point, laying down next to him and nickering softly, making him feel the lowest he’s ever been; he must be looking pathetic if she’s being comforting instead of her usual standoffish behavior.

Nevertheless, Derek lays there as Stiles lays out all the reasons that Derek’s importance is a problem, beginning and ending with the fact that Derek’s from Beacon, something that he thought that they had moved past already…

Unfortunately, it looks like Derek was deluding himself.

He lays there until the sun goes down, until Stiles pushes himself to his feet and places a kiss against Derek’s brow with a gentle, “Thanks, Sourwolf.” before he makes his way back home.

This time, Derek doesn’t wait to make his way back to his camp; what does it matter if Stiles sees him Shift now? Derek needs to tell him the truth anyway, the only reason he didn’t today is because of the crushing realization that the dream that he was starting to build for himself was just a bunch of smoke….

He’s so wrapped up in his own thoughts that it takes him a few moments to realize that there’s already someone sitting in his tent.

Just on the edge of flashing his fangs, a sudden shift in the wind bring a familiar and welcoming scent to his nose:

“Laura?”

His sister jerks at the sound of her name, something that shocks Derek more than the fact that she’s sitting there; his sister is constantly at attention, due to being in the middle of a prank war or just about to start one, so the fact that he was able to sneak up on her is worrying in its own right.

“Laura?” Derek repeats, moving over to his sister’s side and placing a hand on her shoulder. “Are you alright?”

It’s then that his sister-strong and proud and so, so, stubborn-bursts into a horrified wail as she throws herself into his arms.


	8. Letting Go

“You seem awfully chipper today.”

“Am I? I guess I just had a good night’s sleep.”

“Oh? And did any of those dreams happen to have a certain ebony haired-”

With a move that says that he’s already had to do this _so_ _many_ times already, Stiles sticks his fingers in his ears and begins singing, “ _All the plants in the forest/All the bark on the trees/All the animals and rivers/Are all connect to me, to me…_ ”

Claudia’s giggles are a little muffled, but Stiles waits until she smacks at his arms while promising to not bring up Derek before he finally puts his hands down.

“You’re no fun, child.”

“You just like tormenting me.”

“How is it tormenting if I’m simply pointing out that you and Derek seem to be getting pretty clo-”

“ ** _ALL THE ANIMALS AND RIVERS ARE CONNECTED TO ME, TO ME_**!!”

“Alright, alright. No need to get rid of the rest of my hearing…”

Stiles sighs as his mother gets distracted by something else in the house, leaving Stiles to his own thoughts, some of which _do_ indeed have to do with Derek and the fact that he might want something a little more out of their relationship than the friendship they have now…

That would be too greedy, wouldn’t it? They’ve only been friends for a little while, since Stiles was too determined to see Derek as the enemy to realize what was in front of him all along – _yes_ , mother, he will let you say ‘I told you so’ later – and it would be wrong for Stiles to ask Derek for more, right?

And who was to say that Derek was even _interested_ in men? Granted, there were times when Stiles was _sure_ that Derek had been looking at him in the past couple of days, even way in the beginning, but it was hard to tell if those looks were because he was suspicious of Stiles or interested in him. With Stiles’ luck, Derek might have been interested in him when he first came by, but Stiles’ distrust and hostility _immediately_ put him off and Stiles should be grateful that Derek even wants to be _friends_ …

It’s become so bad that Stiles hasn’t even told _Sourwolf_ about this, his complaints about Derek tempering off until they were actually compliments and then just telling the wolf about his day. The closest he’s been to saying how he feels out loud was when he told Sourwolf that Derek was an asshole for becoming so important to him.

The only really important people in Stiles’ life so far have been his mother and his father, and they’re kind of _supposed_ to stick with him. What if Derek _is_ interested in men, but isn’t interested in _Stiles_? At least interested like _that_? It would be _devastating_ that they fought through so much to lose everything just because Stiles grabbed for more as soon as someone reached out-

“Do you know if Derek’s been feeling sick?

His mother’s voice pulls Stiles out of his head, but her question makes his worry grow twofold as he asks, “No, why? What makes you say that?”

“He’s been standing outside of the cottage, staring at the sky like he’s stuck on one particular cloud or something,” Claudia states, pointing out the window at Derek’s still form. “The only time I’ve ever seen that was when someone was fighting off a fever or when that Boyd kid stumbled into my herb garden on a dare and breathed in something he shouldn’t. Derek doesn’t seem to be the kind of man who would indulge in something like that, so…”

Her voice trails off as Stiles moves out to greet Derek and possibly find out what is bothering him. The man doesn’t _seem_ sick, but his skin is a bit pale and he seems almost distracted when he answers Stiles’ greeting…

…not to mention, every joke that Stiles makes is met with a short answer and Derek seems to almost be herding him close to the house and well when they usually have been wandering around the whole property the past few days.

It’s almost like Derek is trying to keep this visit as short as possible…

Already on edge due to Derek’s distracted air, Stiles feels that he gets a pass when he eventually snaps, “For someone that says that he _wants_ to be here, you are acting an awful lot like someone who wishes they _weren’t_!”

His words seem to pull Derek out of whatever stupor he was in, with him blinking at Stiles like he’s surprised to see him there. “What…? No! I mean, I _do_ what to be here! I do! It’s just that… there was a warning left at Beacon’s border last night and it’s been weighing on my mind, that’s all.”

“What kind of warning?”

Derek is already shaking his head almost as soon as Stiles asks the question. “A serious warning, but nothing that we can deal with right now, so why don’t we go inside and-”

“Derek, it’s obviously more than a ‘serious warning’ if you’re trying to make me stay inside all day! I’ve _never_ spent more than a few hours in this cottage since before I even learned how to walk, and you _know_ that! So, come on. I _do_ know a little bit of magic if that helps!”

Stiles finishes his speech with a little wag of his fingers, hoping to get Derek to laugh, but there’s barely a twitch of the man’s lips before he’s sighing out a heavy breath and rubbing a hand over his face.

“The animal remains have been getting closer to the village as the weeks have passed, making the village more and more antsy with there being no sign on who has been doing this.” For a moment, it looks like an expression of guilt flits across Derek’s face, but it’s gone in a blink and Stiles can’t be sure that he saw anything at all. “It seems like, not only are the remains _right at_ Beacon’s border but they… they aren’t animal remains this time.”

For the briefest of moments, Stiles thinks that Derek is there because his suspicion of Stiles and his mother has returned, that he thinks that they have something to do with the killings again, but he pushes that thought away almost as soon as it forms: Derek isn’t like that, Stiles _know_ s this, and he has stated multiple times that he thought it was amazing what Stiles could do.

There is another reason for his tension, something more than the upsetting message and Stiles says so.

Once more, Derek hesitates, and Stiles can almost tell what is coming before Derek even opens his mouth, eyes closing as Derek’s voice drops to an apologetic whisper.

“This last message… it has really riled the villagers up. It’s like something has possessed them; they’re unreasonable and so fearful that even the _slightest_ bit of strangeness has them on their guard. They… they won’t listen when I tell them that they have nothing to fear from you, from either of you. They scream about how you choose to live alone and never come into the village unless something has happened to one of them… They’ve taken to scouring the woods, to make sure that you can’t use it for your ‘dark magic’ and I fear what would happen if any of them came upon either of you on your own… so I’ve decided that neither of you will _be_ on your own now.”

Despite knowing, deep in his bones that something like this was brewing when the first animal corpse showed up, Stiles still feels a ball of dread hit his stomach when the words leave Derek’s mouth. He can’t even feel properly pleased that Derek cares so much for him that he’s basically willing to stand between them and people he’s known his entire life…

Anger quickly follows the despair, both at the villager’s callous disregard for Stiles’ family and the fact that they have forced this decision on Derek; the man has mentioned his family a few times in the conversations they had in the past and Stiles is afraid to ask if any of them are among the ones calling for his death.

“Well, I’m not going to just sit idly by while those fear-mongers try to take away my life! Especially when my father still hasn’t returned and could stumble upon them!” A sudden, horrible thought enters Stiles’ mind and he curses himself for not thinking of it sooner as he grasps at Derek’s tunic in an almost manic demand.

“Derek! The remains… They weren’t-? They _aren’t_ -?”

Again, Derek is shaking his head almost before Stiles is finished speaking, making a wave of relief flow through Stiles so strongly that he almost loses his footing.

“No, no, Stiles. They didn’t know _who_ it was, but they could tell that it wasn’t anyone from the village… or the cottage in the woods on Beacon’s border.”

The last is said with a sort of smile, no doubt Derek trying to get Stiles to laugh, but the giggle that slips past Stiles’ lips is more of a sob than anything else. Thankfully, Derek doesn’t say anything and simply holds Stiles until he can get his feet back underneath him.

Wiping his hands over his face, Stiles takes a few steps away from Derek and tries not to feel too embarrassed about how weak he was in front of him. Granted, it’s his _dad_ and was scared that the man was **_dead_** , the last thing that Stiles needs right now is Derek thinking he has justifiable cause to lock him up for ‘his own safety’…

Sure enough, as soon as Stiles meets Derek’s eyes again, the man is frowning back at him and intoning, “You need to stay close to the cottage, Stiles. Help your mother with her poultices and pastes. Just… stay close to home until the villagers have calmed down or this Dark Witch is caught.”

Shaking his head, Stiles brings himself up to his full height and meets Derek’s gaze head-on. “That’s not possible, Derek, and you know it! These are my woods, mine and my family’s! We know them a lot better than any of the villagers do! I doubt half of them haven’t even set foot in there before today!”

“That’s not the point! _The point is_ that they’re angry and looking for someone to blame-”

“How is that any different than how they act on any _other_ given day? I can _help you_ , I have my Spark-”

“Damn it to the Pits, Stiles! This isn’t some game of glow-lights! They can and _will_ kill you if you set one foot amid those trees! Can’t you see what danger you’re in right now?!? Just do what I say and stay out of the way!”

They’re both breathing heavy by the time Derek is finished, despite him being the only one that was yelling. Stiles, on the other hand, is fighting off a mixture of being pleased that Derek cares about him enough to want to protect him (as misguided as that is) and being absolutely **_pissed_** that Derek thinks that he can just shove him to the side and wander into danger _himself_.

In the end, Stiles knows that Derek will not be moved on this and anything he may say will turn the tentative bond that they’ve nurtured between themselves into dust. So, he does the next best thing.

He slams the cottage door in Derek’s face.

The thud garners Claudia’s attention and Stiles can see his mother watching him out of the corner of his eye as he makes his way over to his bed and throws himself across it in a huff.

“Did you and Derek have a lover’s tiff? He usually stays for longer than that…”

Stiles’ response is to scream into his pillow, the release of his frustration making the house shake, Claudia snapping at him to stop it when her monkshood comes precariously close to toppling to the floor.

There are few moments of silence before Stiles feels the bed dip as his mother settles in next to him, fingers finding their way into his hair and stroking gently as Stiles gets his breathing back under control.

“He had a point, my darling.”

Stiles lifts his head high enough to glare at his mother, only to receive an even more intimidating glare in return.

(Damn, and he thought _Derek’s_ brows were impressive when they were furrowed like that!)

“Stiles!” His attention snaps back to the present and he’s a little uneasy at the smirk his mother is giving him, but then her face becomes serious again and she moves her hand so that it rests on Stiles’ shoulder.

“This… this is the worst that I’ve ever felt Beacon’s fear become… and I agree with Derek. I think that we should stay here where we can protect each until your father returns and try to find somewhere… somewhere that won’t try to burn us at the stake at the first sight of trouble.”

Those words have Stiles sitting straight up in a sudden realization, heart pounding as the feeling of elation at finally **_getting away_** from this hellhole is immediately followed by the stray thought of ‘ _That means I’ll never see Derek again…_ ”

“This is our home, Mom!” Claudia looks as surprised as Stiles feels, arguing for staying here when his entire life has been dreaming of ways to get as far away as possible. “We have a right to be here as much as anyone else! Hell, if you weren’t here, a lot of them wouldn’t be either!”

Claudia simply shakes her head in that soft, final way that says that nothing Stiles will say can change her mind and he feels his heart grow as cold as a stone when she states, “I will not lose you to this Darkness, Stiles. We will wait until your father returns and leave Beacon. I know- I’m sorry that this has to happen, especially now that things are changing for you, but I would rather you hate me forever than have to bury you.”

That is the last word spoken for the rest of the day, as Stiles can’t think of anything that would make it past the lump in his throat and Claudia seems willing to let him mull over everything in silence. It seems like no time at all has passed until the sun has set and they make their way to bed.

Stiles waits until he hears his mother’s breathing evening out, her soft sighs that mean that she’s deep into sleep before he slowly makes his way out of his bed and to where his shoes are sitting.

He knows that what he’s doing is wrong, that he’s directly defying one of the few orders that his mother has ever given him, but Stiles can’t really think past the maelstrom of emotions going through his head and he needs to go to the one place that he always feels at peace…

…or rather, to the two creatures that calm and soothe the ragged edges of his mind.

The cottage door squeaks slightly as Stiles exited the house, making him freeze in his tracks and strain his ears to hear if the sound woke up his mother. After a full minute of holding his breath, Stiles slowly slides the rest of the way out of the house and softly closes the door behind him.

He also waits until he makes it to the edge of their land to break out into a run, the quiet night and Derek’s ominous words making a chill travel down his spine as he feels himself leave the protective circle of his home.

After half an hour, Stiles is feeling much calmer as he walks through the woods, the tension that had settled in the bend of his shoulders has disappeared and he’s almost tempted to start whistling when a sudden snapping noise behind him makes all the panic spring back again.

For the first time in his life, Stiles wishes that the person he spins around to see is one of the villagers.

It's... not one of the villagers.

There’s only the briefest glimpse of rotting, crooked teeth before a purple beam of light is thrown in Stiles’ direction, making him dive behind the nearest tree. 

* * *

Derek knows that he shouldn’t be angry, that Stiles has lived his entire life in fear of the village and still managed to survive despite all of that, but there is still a small part of him that bristles at the fact that the response to him _trying to keep Stiles from being killed_ was for Stiles to get mad at him!

“Hey, Hale! I hear you’ve been spending a lot of time with those witches! Did you get them to admit that they’re the ones behind these killings? Are we close to their hut? I know that it’s around here somewhere…”

Breathing in deeply, Derek knows that his temper isn’t helped by walking around with the rest of the village and finally hearing the hate that Stiles has always said was there, just bubbling underneath the surface. It takes him a few deep breaths to realize that the voice has gone silent and he looks up to figure out why.

His mother is standing beside him and she’s staring off at some poor bastard’s retreating back like she wishes she had Stiles’ ability to manipulate the elements. Derek can’t wait for her to meet Stiles once all of this is-

A sudden memory of Stiles’ face when he slammed the door on him and an echo of the words, “ _…Derek has become important to me… and it’s so **frustrating**! That **asshole**_!” has him cutting off that thought before it can go much further.

Stiles hates that he even cares about _Derek_ , why would he ever want to meet his family?

“Derek? Sweetheart?” Talia immediately puts her arm around Derek’s shoulder, somehow knowing that he needs the closeness of his family and that he’s one more vile word away from ripping out someone’s throat.

With his teeth.

“I’m fine,” he insists before she can ask, knowing that if he starts talking about Stiles and everything that comes with him, he’s not going to be able to focus on anything else and there is a Dark Witch wandering around…

Talia makes a humming noise as she scans the surrounding area, her eyes glimmering a brief red before she turns her gaze back to her son with a slight crease above her nose.

“Laura said that you were in wolf form when you came back to your camp, that you had a strange scent clinging to you, and that your scent at the campsite was barely there... almost as if you had spent the least amount of time there that you could! Are you sure you’re alright, son? Because there’s only one other place you could’ve been for the last month and a half-”

“What- Stiles didn’t do anything to me!” Derek can feel his wolf pushing at his voice when he snaps at his mother, forgetting for a moment that she’s also his Alpha and instead meets her gaze head-on. “Claudia and Stiles have been nothing but kind to me, despite the last person that ever came to their house spent most of the time threatening Claudia and twisting Stiles up so much that he never trusts anyone!”

Derek tries not to let his anger slip out as tears, even as he closes his eyes to fight the burning in them. Stiles does not owe him anything, he should be grateful for the friendship that they have, but he keeps remembering the upset in Stiles’ voice when he was talking about them and can’t help but think that Stiles doesn’t even want that anymore…

Warm hands cup his face before he can turn away and Talia Hale looks deep into her son’s eyes, almost as if she’s digging out every secret and blooming feeling that Derek’s trying to hide. It feels both freeing and extremely vulnerable, making Derek feel stuck between wanting to push forward and pull away.

“I didn’t mean it like that, my sweet one. I was simply trying to tease you a bit to get you to talk to me…” Her voice is so soft as she looks him over again, a look of pride overtaking her features as she continues, “You have grown up so much in these past few days. Your father and I are so proud of you.”

His heart beats once, twice, and then a third time before she releases him, pressing a kiss to his forehead as she does so. Derek blinks at her, unsure if he should say anything or just let the silence speak for him before someone screams out that they found something.

Derek makes it a few steps before Talia presses a hand against his chest, pushing him in a completely different (but not unknown) direction.

“Stay near Claudia and Stiles tonight.” At his raised brow, Talia simply mimics the motion. “Claudia isn’t dumb enough to make her home somewhere that doesn’t have some sort of protection on it, and I can feel the same on you.”

Derek presses a hand against his chest, just to the right of where his mother’s hand rests and softly states, “It wasn’t Claudia… it was Stiles.”

Talia outright _beams_ at that, giving him one more push as she moves to follow the rest of the village, no doubt leading them on a merry chase to keep them occupied and away from the Stilinskis.

Moving in the direction that Talia had pushed him, Derek makes his own detour to a quiet clearing that no one seemed to realize was a pathway away…

Maybe the house wasn’t the only place that the Stilinskis protected…?

The unicorn is there, looking him over with her usual level of disdain and Derek has to fight off a childish urge to stick his tongue out at her. It’s funny, but she almost reminds him of Laura and the way that she always seems to be judging him.

Well, she would be if she wasn’t a mythical creature capable of skewering him like a shishkabob…

No, Derek thinks with a wary eye on the rather sharp horn on the unicorn head, she reminds him exactly of Laura.

It takes a moment before Derek realizes the look that the unicorn is giving him; it was a look that very clearly said that she wanted to know what he was doing just standing around.

“You and I both know that Stiles isn’t going to just sit around in his house, no matter what anyone tells him.” A sigh-like nicker tells him that the unicorn agrees with him, so Derek feels a little better about telling her his fears. “Chances are that he’ll come here at some point to talk with his ‘Sourwolf’ and then-”

Derek breaks off as he tries to think of what will come next; does he expect Stiles to listen to him after he finds out that Derek was lying to him all this time? Derek knows that Stiles will be angry, Derek would be angry, and that his chances of even being the man’s friend after this are basically buried in the Earth by now…

Maybe Stiles would understand? He knew how the village reacted to anything different, that they were quick to fear things that they didn’t understand, so maybe Stiles would get why it had been so hard for Derek to say ‘I’m a werewolf and I’ve been protecting you these past few months. Oh, by the way, I think I’m in love with you and I hope that you will agree to be my m-”

A sudden, sharp smell is a welcomed distraction… before Derek realizes that its _blood_.

 ** _Stiles_** ’ blood.

Nearly tripping in his haste, Derek runs in the direction the smell came in, dimly aware of the sound of horse hooves behind him as he dodges through the underbrush, cutting his fingers open with the force that he uses to push the tangles away from himself.

It doesn’t take too long before the sounds of battle reached him, the same wind and ozone that had been in the air the only time that Stiles had lost his temper in front of him.

Only this time, it’s nearly overrun with the scent of blood, pain, and fear as a heartbeat thunders out a frantic rhythm in sympathy with the cries that Stiles is making, and Derek can see him, _see_ that he’s bound to a tree so tightly that his entire arms are bloody-

With a roar of utter anger and _fear_ , Derek throws himself forward and prays that he’s not too late.


	9. All's Well That Ends Well

Stiles is a complete and utter idiot.

He knows, he _knows_ , that he should never have left the house tonight. Every instinct and gut feeling had told him that going out was a mistake, that he should have listened to Derek (and his mother, especially) and stayed home…

Now, he was going to be torn apart, just another body for the village to find, for his mother to get blamed for…

Fighting back a sob and trying desperately to break free, Stiles can’t help but think of all the things that he never got to do; he never perfected his Spark, instead relying on his gut feeling to guide him, he never made it past this stupid little hill that their house stood on, never showed Beacon how little their opinion of him mattered.

He never got to tell Derek how he felt about him…

That one hurts the most because he believed that he and Derek could have been something special. Yes, there was a part of Stiles that was scared that something he would do would drive Derek off, that his inability to keep quiet and still would annoy the other man to no end, but now he’ll never know. He’ll never know if they could have worked through their problems, or if they would’ve just ended up hating each other.

The Darach – not a Dark Witch, _so much worse_ than a Dark Witch – is coming closer with every second, the scent of rotting flesh and ash overpowering and nearly making Stiles gag as he tries even harder to pull free. He wishes that he had just one second to go back, to tell Derek how he felt, that he was grateful that the other man cared, that he-

An almighty roar echoes through the forest, shaking a storm of leaves down on Stiles’ head and then something slams into the Darach from the side with a sickening crunch of bone and sinew. It causes Stiles to retch, but he’s more grateful that he can feel the vines binding him to the tree loosen now that the Darach is distracted.

Slipping down from the tree and stumbling a few feet away, Stiles lifts his head to see who his rescuer is and is really glad he’s already on the forest floor because he’s already in pain and he doesn’t think that falling over in shock would help any of his injuries…

It’s Derek.

No, it’s Derek with _fur covering his face_ and **_fangs_** gleaming in his mouth!

Stiles is pretty sure that his jaw is somewhere in the region of his knees and he can’t do more than sit there, despite the urge to move and do something is still thrumming through him.

Derek… is a Shifter.

It makes a hysterical hiccup of a laugh slip past Stiles’ lips, unsure of whether he wants to laugh or scream. It’s so ridiculous that he finds this out now, now that they’re fighting for their lives and only seconds away from death.

Well, Derek is fighting for their lives and Stiles is just sitting here on his ass. He needs to do something, especially since Derek goes flying through the air and hits the tree behind him with a worrying _crack_.

The Darach makes a sound that is suspiciously like a cackle, jaw working in a way that makes Stiles’ stomach lurch. He pushes himself to his feet, legs unsteady and barely holding him up, but he still puts himself between the Darach and Derek.

He’s not going to let them die, not when there’s so much that they still need to say to each other, things that they need to yell about and fight over. It’s not going to end before that happens.

Not like this, not now.

Stiles is bracing himself against the rock or whatever it is that’s next to him, trying to pull his Spark into some kind of order when the Darach start lurching toward him. Its steps are jerky and only a shadow of how a normal human would walk, but Stiles can feel its power crawling over him like an upended anthill and he can’t stop the shivers that follow.

His hands are just coming up to at least put a protective shield around them when the Darach suddenly stops with a popping noise. It takes longer than Stiles would like to admit to notice the sheer alabaster horn that is sticking through the Darach’s chest, and it’s just long enough for the unicorn to shake the dead weight off her horn.

Stiles blinks down at the body at his feet a few times before looking back up at the unicorn. “Well, that was a bit anticlimactic.”

She shakes her head at him like she’s annoyed that they were taking too long on their own, before heading over to Derek’s prone form and gently touching him with her horn.

A soft glow covers Derek’s form and it’s only a second before the man is waking with a groan, blinking around himself like he isn’t sure how he got there. Stiles is even more appreciative of the unicorn now, especially when the unicorn moves over to him and taps him as well, although Stiles suspects that his is a little more than a love tap.

He doesn’t blame her, he _did_ almost die because he didn’t listen, after all…

“Stiles?”

Turning, Stiles looks into Derek’s eyes and is amazed by the number of colors he had never noticed before. Another not-so-sane giggle threatens to escape Stiles when he sees the smear of blood from the unicorn’s horn on Derek’s cheek and a quick check tells him that there’s a steady stream still flowing down her horn.

“Stiles?” Derek is starting to look really worried now, and Stiles tries to stop the giggling before it turns into sobbing. “Are you alright?”

“So, you’re a Shifter.”

Derek freezes for a second before his eyes go shuttered and guarded. “I am.”

Stiles bites back the need to gather Derek up and make that expression go away. There are still a few things that need to be said. “Something my mother said makes a lot more sense now. You’re the wolf I’ve been talking to all this time, aren’t you? You’re my- You’re Sourwolf, aren’t you?”

“Yes.”

This time, Stiles can’t help the twitch forward he makes, but he stops himself with a heavy sigh. He needs to say this next part, needs to get it out before he loses his nerves or lets that voice in his head convince him not to.

“Okay. I’m going to be really mad at you about that later on. I’m probably going to scream at you for it, going holler about lying -whether outright or not, that was what you did- and you’ll probably see a lot less of me for a while… but not right now.”

“No?” Derek sounds confused, but there’s also a little bit of hopefulness in there as well and Stiles just _has_ to smile at that.

“No, because we almost died and there’s something I want to do first, something that I never thought I was going to able to do.”

So saying, Stiles takes Derek’s confused face in between his hands and proceeds to kiss the living daylights out of the man.

It takes Derek a few to understand what was going on, but once he does, Stiles gets to feel the heady sensation of Derek’s arms wrapping around him and pulling him as close as he possibly can be.

It’s the most amazing feeling in the world and Stiles indulges in it for as long as he can without the air, before pulling away to breathlessly state, “Remember, I’m going to be really mad at you later. So… just remember this moment, alright?”

“Are there going to be more of this after you’re mad at me?” Derek’s eyes are wide and innocent, but his hands are gripping at Stiles like he’s a lifeline, so Stiles decides not to tease him.

“Of course. Just never lie to me again or keep something so big a secret from me.”

“I can live with that.”

 

* * *

 

Derek bites down on his bottom lip, certain that laughing right now will end up with him in hotter water than the ‘I’m-really-your-Sourwolf’ thing did. Stiles shooting him a narrowed eyed look gave credit to that thought and Claudia letting out a little giggle of her own made him feel a lot better about his own trouble with his laughter.

When Stiles had introduced Derek to his father only a few days after the Darach was burned and buried, Derek is pretty sure that Stiles expected the man to be intimidating and try to run Derek off.

Having John almost immediately bond with Derek over the fact that Stiles is going to give both of them premature grey hairs had Stiles refusing to talk to _anyone_ for the next few days.

(He was already in hot water with Claudia as soon as he made it back home. It didn’t matter that there was a Darach or not, Claudia was a moment away from killing Stiles _herself_ for scaring her so badly.)

A bit of cajoling, bribing, and a few kisses between Derek and Stiles had restored the peace in the house. It also showed Derek that, despite there being only three people in it, that it could be just as rowdy as the Hale House when it was filled up to the brim.

It now had been three weeks since the Darach, since his mother had petitioned for witches to be seen as equal citizens of Beacon, since Laura had taken over Derek’s seat on the Council, arguing that she wasn’t going to let them all stay ‘stuffy old men’….

Three weeks since his father had pulled Derek into a big bear hug when his son had shown him the red eyes of an Alpha and talked about his own little pack. Since Talia had repeated how proud she was of him. Since he was bamboozled with question after question from little cousins and he tried to answer them all, seeing as he wouldn’t be seeing them in a while.

Now, they’re staring at an empty house and Derek is trying not to laugh at the way that Stiles is explaining to John about how they met. As both a wolf and as a human. For the fourth time that week alone.

(John had sworn off hunting for the rest of his life, shocked and dismayed at how close they had all come to tragedy while he was away. Stiles hadn’t helped anything when he had claimed that was fine by him, seeing as Derek could do all the hunting and more for the three of them. Claudia had smacked her son on the shoulder, scolding him for not understanding how his father felt.

Derek hadn’t helped matters when he went out the next day and brought home a couple of stags, only halfway because he wanted to show that he could provide for them if they needed it. It was also one of the only times that John had been mad at him…)

Derek moves over to a huddle of trees and begins to slowly strip down to his skin, his mind wandering over the conversation that he had with John a few days ago when he had come across the ring his mother had hidden in his pack the last time he had gone to visit…

Derek has been completely honest with Stiles ever since their talk/fight about him keeping his wolf form a secret. He’s been truthful about everything, except one small thing.

He had talked to John about it, to make sure that it was really something that should be kept quiet or if it was something that he should tell Stiles. John, who had heard their story three times already (the things that Claudia knew, the parts Stiles knew, and Derek’s side of the story), had shaken his head and clapped a hand on Derek’s shoulder as he told him that this might be the _only_ thing that Stiles would be happy he kept a secret.

With a pop of his neck, Derek drops to all fours for the first time in… well, in three weeks. He had been worried that Shifting into his wolf form would upset Stiles, that after talking through everything, seeing him as a wolf would ruin all of that.

He had continued to think so until Stiles had poked him in the shoulder and asked, casual as you please, “Haven’t seen Sourwolf in a while, he hasn’t run away, has he?”

With a stretch that goes from his toes to his tail, Derek trots out to where Stiles and his father are, puffing up under Claudia’s appreciative eye and giving a short bark to get the other two’s attention.

John jumps a little, but seeing how calm Claudia and Stiles are makes it a lot easier for him to be so as well. Stiles immediately goes to Derek’s side to rub a hand over his ears before stopping suddenly with a frown.

“Wait… you did this so that you didn’t have to explain things to my dad, didn’t you? Asshole!”

Derek parts his lips in a wolfy laugh, enjoying the way that John’s voice goes up when he sees the unicorn – which Stiles has lovingly named Leia – on the edge of the forest.

He has heard Stiles call him an asshole in many different tones, but as long as there’s affection there, Derek doesn’t think he minds it all that much.

(It’s not like he isn’t just as bad…)

“Let’s go, Sourwolf! You’re burning daylight!”

With a playful growl, Derek nips at Stiles heels, causing him to laugh and Leia to shake her head at the both of them. This makes Derek throw his head back in a joyous howl, one he can hear echoing back from down in the valley, as the entire family takes a moment to say goodbye to the little house on the hill and set off to the next part of their adventure.

Wherever that may be.


End file.
